Bengaluru startup demonstrates mini satellite launch, with a drone!

Bypassing rockets, a Bengaluru-based aerospace startup has demonstrated how a satellite can be launched through a drone.

The startup, Lakshya Space, recently conducted and showcased the drone launch of a satellite, VAYU-A Sat1, arguably one of the country’s first such efforts in a small scale.

High-altitude satellites could find it challenging to accurately track the Earth’s atmosphere at heights far lower than 2,000 km or more. It is here that Lakshya Space chose to make a foray, using drones to launch satellites to a lower altitude and study the atmosphere and landscape more clearly and with better accuracy.

Lakshya Space, its co-founder Dhanush D B informs, used a DJI drone equipped to carry nearly 1 kg payload to take the cube satellite (mini satellite) up to an altitude of 250 m from the Aadhya farm in the city’s Yelahanka. At this altitude, he says, the satellite’s potential for real-time atmospheric, climatic and geographical studies is huge.

Currently, cube satellites are launched either by helium balloons or medium-scale rockets to a Lower Earth Orbit (LEO). “The drone we used could take the satellite up to an altitude of a kilometre. But even at 250 m, the satellite can track data over a 1-km radius on air quality, humidity and temperature. The captured data from the cubesat is fed into our ground-based receiver linked to laptops,” he explains.

It took 2 minutes and 12 seconds for the drone to take the satellite to the predetermined orbit. It touched down safely after hovering for a minute and 36 seconds. But this range could be extended once the technology demonstration graduates to the next step.

Use of 3D printing technology helped Lakshya to bring down the cube satellite cost to about Rs 15,000, says Dhanush. “We have been designing and developing such cube satellites. We have also submitted a proposal to the Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro).

The drone launch method could also find applications in futuristic communication technology. “In the future, the team has plans to study livestock, wild vegetation and water bodies, besides changes in air pollution, spread of dangerous air-borne diseases and even bee and bird pollination,” says a team member.

Besides Dhanush and cofounder Deepak M Kurubar, both graduates of Srinivas Institute of Technology, the team also has Hari Kiran, Jai Kumar, Shijo Shaji and Shivaram.