Countdown for RISAT-I begins

 After a highly successful Agni-V missile launch, India’s space establishment has  unraveled its next launch of satellite - RISAT-I.

The Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) early on Monday began a 71-hour countdown for the launch of its latest remote sensing, ‘Radar Imaging Satellite –RISAT-1’, at the Satish Dhawan Space Centre at Sriharikota. The countdown began at 6:47 hours on Monday, the ISRO said in a press release. The ‘RISAT-1’ will be carried by a Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV-C19) on Thursday, it said.

The ‘Launch Authorization Board’ for the mission has cleared the launch of the ‘PSLV-C19/RISAT-1’ mission as early at 05:47 hours on April 26. The launch vehicle will inject the ‘RISAT-1’ satellite into an orbit of 480 km altitude and at an inclination of 97.552 degrees, the release said. It will be India’s first radar imaging satellite to be put into orbit.

The satellite will be put in its final orbit configuration at 536 km altitude “using thrusters on board the satellite,” the ISRO said.