THE STORY OF INDIAN SATELLITES: Essay Topics

THE STORY OF INDIAN SATELLITES

On 18th July, 1980 at 8.04 a.m. India launched the third Satellite, Rohini RS-I into the orbit. It was a matter of great pleasure and satisfaction for the Indian Scientists as well as for the whole nation that an indigenously developed SL-3 fabricated at the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre at Trivandrum went off from the Indian Space Research Organization’s Sriharikota, Range, 100 k.m. north of Madras.

It is orbiting the earth once in ninety minutes. By launching ‘Rohini RS-l India became the sixth nation with Satellite lunching capability. The success of Rohini encouraged the Indian Scientists and technologist to do another feat in the direction.           .

Apple was built by ISRO Satellite Centre in Bangalore. Its building cost announced to Rs. 190 millions. It was assembled in three and a half years, a record time. ‘Apple’ was launched into the orbit by the European Space Agency Asian rocket from Kourou in French Guyana on June 19, 1981. It is a geostationary satellite, which has improved the communication system of India to a great extent.

After half an hour of its take off, the stations at Sriharikota, Ahmadabad, Fizi and Kourou received signal from it. These signals were about the attitude, temperature and electronic gadgets. The weight of ‘APPLE’ at launching time was 673 Kg. And in the orbit is about 380 Kg. All the system in the Apple worked satisfactorily and sent various useful signals to many centers on the earth. In completing one full orbit, it took APPLE’ about ten and a half hours. The launching of ‘APPLE’ has made it possible to undertake a vast range of experiments on communication. The usefulness of ‘Apple’ has been that the scientists and the technicians have learnt the technique of building and operating communication satellites on their own.

Indian scientists did another important exciting feat by launching INSAT-IA into orbit and the country felt proud of them. INS AT-IA is the Indian National Satellite launched by a Delta Launch Vehicle of the United States from Kennedy Space Centre in the Florida Coast on April 10, 1982.

INS AT is the first of its kind and can successfully perform functions of meteorology, television and telecommunication. In June, 1983, another satellite INSAT-IB that was to be launched by the U. S. Space Shuttle, to join INSAT-IA. It is a project of the Department of Space, Indian Meteorological Department, Post and Telegraph, Indian Radio and Doordarshan and the Foed Aero Space Communication Corporation.

The Indian Meteorological Department managed more than one hundred data collection platforms throughout the country for INSAT-IA. These platforms automatically take the environmental observations once every hour. The Delhi Station of All India Radio has five Radio networking uplinks with INSAAT-IA.

In short, INSAT-IA is the first satellite the uses of which are manifold, its life span is about seven years. And thus India has become the sixth nation of the world of achieve launching capability and ninth country to manufacture geostationary satellite. We bow our heads in reverence to our great Indian Scientists and technicians who have done the most remarkable feats for the benefit of mankind.