PSLV to carry Italian Satellite
Wednesday, April 11th, 2007
The PSLV-C8 (Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle), which will deploy an Italian satellite Agile, will lift off from Sriharikota in Andra Pradesh on april 23.
B.N.Suresh, Director, Vikaram Sarabhai Space Centre, Thiruvananthapuram, said tha the launch preparations for PSLV-C8 were progressing satisfactorily and they were going on without any problem.
The 360 kg Italian satellite Agile, has arrived at the Satish Dhawan space Centre at Sriharikota. The PSLV-C8, the 11th in the series, will also carry the Indian Space Research Organisation’s Advanced Avionics Module (AMM), which weighs about 180 kg. The satellite will go into a circular orbit 560 km above the earth.
For the first time, the PSLV-C8 will fly without its six strap-on booster motors. The core-allone vehicle will have two-control motors in the first stage fir achieving symmetry. The Agile and the AMM will be launched without the strap-on motors because the weight of Agile and AMM put together is only 540 kg.
A PSLV with the normal configuration, which includes the strap-on motors, can put a satellite weighting 1600 kg in orbit. The PSLV, a four stage vehicle, is 44 m tall and weights 295 tonnes. The PSLV-C8, minus the strap-on motors, will weigh around 240 tonnes.
The Agile satellite will have payloads to investigate gamma ray bursts, pulsars and supernova remnants. The Agile mission is supported by the Italian Space Agency, the Italian Institute of Astrophysics and the Italian Institute of Nuclear Physics.
