ISRO’s first mission of 2019 to put military satellite Microsat-R in space

Mains Paper 3: Science & Technology | Awareness in the fields of IT, Space, Computers, robotics etc.

From UPSC perspective, the following things are important:

Prelims level: Particulars of the payload

Mains level: Importance of the mission

ISRO’s first mission of 2019 will put into space a 130-kg military imaging satellite, Microsat-R.
C-44 will be launched from the older First Launch Pad at the Satish Dhawan Space Centre, Sriharikota.

Details of Launch

The satellite would be placed within 15 minutes after take-off in a polar orbit 274 km away from Earth.
This is much lower than any of its civil Earth observation spacecraft, which fly pole to pole over the globe at between 400 km and 700 km.

Microsat-R

Microsat-R and its payload come assembled from a handful of laboratories of the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO).
It is meant for military use.
The satellite was assembled outside and ISRO only interfaced it” with its own systems and the launch vehicle, just as it treats any customer satellite.
Other details are yet to be released by ISRO.

Kalamsat

Kalamsat is a communication satellite with a life span of two months.
The nanosatellite is a 10cm cube weighing 1.2 kg.
The satellite cost was about Rs 12 lakh Kalamsat will be the first to use the rocket’s fourth stage as an orbital platform.
The fourth stage will be moved to higher circular orbit so as to establish an orbital platform for carrying out experiments.
It is named after former Indian president Dr APJ Abdul Kalam and was built by an Indian high school student team, led by Rifath Sharook, an 18-year-old from the Tamil Nadu town of Pallapatti.
It is the world’s lightest and first ever 3D-printed satellite.