THE INDIAN Space Research Organisation (ISRO) will launch the third development flight - the last one it is authorised to undertake - of the small satellite launch vehicle (SSLV) on August 16. The vehicle will carry the 175-kg earth observation satellite EOS-08 on board, according to the space agency. The small vehicle - capable of carrying only up to 500 kg to space - was developed by ISRO with the aim of commercialising it. Globally, there is a growing demand for small launch vehicles that can be quickly assembled on demand to launch scores of small and micro-satellites to be placed in low earth orbit. ISRO is now in the process of transferring the technology to private players to undertake commercial flights. There are at least six companies that are in the running to acquire the technology. All future missions of the SSLV will be carried out by the private company chosen, according to ISRO officials. In fact, ISRO's commercial arm New Space India Limited (NSIL) signed an MoU to launch an Australian satellite on-board such a privately run SSLV in the future. The planned mission will take to space a satellite that can repair others in-orbit by the Australian company Space Machines Company. The vehicle is just 2 metres in diameter and 34 metres long. It uses three solid fuel-based stages and a final liquid-fuel based stage to correct the velocity for placing small and micro satellites in orbit. After a narrow miss during the first development flight of the vehicle in August 2022, it managed to successfully insert three satellites in a 450-km circular orbit in February 2023. According to the failure analysis of its first development flight, the intended orbit could not be achieved because of excessive vibrations recorded by the on-board accelerometers during stage 2 separation, which led the on-board system to think that the sensors were faulty. With the system designed to isolate faulty sensors and go into a salvage mode, the last velocity-trimming module was not switched on as per the programming. This led to a shortfall in velocity and the satellites were injected in a highly elliptical orbit that cannot be maintained and they fell into the atmosphere. The satellite The EOS-08 will also demonstrate several technologies developed by the space agency. The satellite will carry three instruments. The Electro Optical Infrared Payload (EOIR) is designed to capture images in mid-wave and long-wave infra-red during day and night. The data can be used for surveillance, disaster monitoring, environmental monitoring, fire detection, volcanic activity observation, and industrial and power plant disaster monitoring.
