Next mission with NASA among 9 launches planned by ISRO this financial year

Sriharikota: As many as nine satellites, including another joint collaboration between the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and the US’ National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), are planned to be launched by the end of the 2025-2026 financial year.

ISRO chairman V Narayanan, addressing scientists after the successful launch of the NISAR mission, said the next major launch from the Sathish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC), Sriharikota will be the LVM3-M5 Mission which will launch a communication satellite CMS-02.

After NISAR, and Axiom-4 which took Indian Air Force’s Group Captain Shubanshu Shukla to the International Space Station (ISS) and back to earth, the ISRO and NASA are working to launch Blue Bird Block2 satellite, a communication satellite of the US.

“ISRO will to launch the satellite using its LVM-3 vehicle" Narayanan said, adding in the coming months, PSLV-C61 would launch a OCEANSAT-3A while GSLV-F18 would launch GISAT-1A satellite. The agency is also aiming to launch a couple of Small Satellite Launch Vehicle missions.

Narayanan said after the LVM3-M5 mission, a Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) C63 is targeted for launching a user funded satellite.

"This will be followed by the first PSLV (Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle) which has been realised by the industrial consortium called as the PSLV-N1,” he said, adding that the first launcher will be rolled out from the private industry consortium.