{"id":309037,"date":"2019-02-06T05:26:16","date_gmt":"2019-02-06T05:26:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tehelka.com\/?p=309037"},"modified":"2019-02-06T05:26:16","modified_gmt":"2019-02-06T05:26:16","slug":"indias-communication-satellite-gsat-31-launched-successfully-from-french-guiana","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/indias-communication-satellite-gsat-31-launched-successfully-from-french-guiana\/","title":{"rendered":"India\u2019s communication satellite GSAT-31 launched successfully from French Guiana"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"font-weight: 400; text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\" wp-image-309038 aligncenter\" src=\"http:\/\/tehelka.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/02\/isro-300x152.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"602\" height=\"305\" srcset=\"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/media\/2019\/02\/isro-300x152.jpg 300w, https:\/\/tehelka.com\/media\/2019\/02\/isro.jpg 656w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 602px) 100vw, 602px\" \/><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400; text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">India\u2019s latest communication satellite, GSAT-31 was successfully launched from the Spaceport in French Guiana during the early hours on Wednesday.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400; text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">The launch vehicle Ariane 5 VA-247 lifted off from Kourou Launch Base, French Guiana at 2:31 am (IST) carrying India\u2019s GSAT-31 and Saudi Geostationary Satellite 1\/Hellas Sat 4 satellites.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400; text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">After a 42-min flight, GSAT-31 separated from the Ariane 5 upper stage in an elliptical Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit with a perigee (nearest point to Earth) of 250 km and an apogee (farthest point to Earth) of 35,850 km, inclined at an angle of 3.0 degree to the equator. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400; text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">With a lift-off mass of 2536 kg, GSAT-31 will augment the Ku-band transponder capacity in Geostationary Orbit. The satellite will provide continuity to operational services on some of the in-orbit satellites. GSAT-31 derives its heritage from ISRO\u2019s earlier INSAT\/GSAT satellite series.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400; text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">\u201cGSAT-31 has a unique configuration of providing flexible frequency segments and flexible coverage.\u00a0 The satellite will provide communication services to Indian mainland and islands\u201d ISRO Chairman Dr K Sivan said.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400; text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">Sivan also remarked that \u201cGSAT-31 will provide DTH Television Services, connectivity to VSATs for ATM, Stock-exchange, Digital Satellite News Gathering (DSNG) and e-governance applications. The satellite will also be used for bulk data transfer for a host of emerging telecommunication applications.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400; text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">After separation from Ariane-5 upper stage, the two solar arrays of GSAT-31 were\u00a0automatically deployed in quick succession and ISRO&#8217;s Master Control Facility at Hassan in Karnataka took over the command and control of GSAT-31 and found its health parameters normal.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400; text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">In the days ahead, scientists will undertake phase-wise orbit-raising manoeuvres to place the satellite in Geostationary Orbit using its on-board propulsion system.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400; text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">The antenna reflector of GSAT-31 will be deployed during the final stages of its orbit raising operations.\u00a0 Following this, the satellite will be put in its final orbital configuration.\u00a0 The satellite will be operational following the successful completion of all in-orbit tests.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>India\u2019s latest communication satellite, GSAT-31 was successfully launched from the Spaceport in French Guiana during the early hours on Wednesday. The launch vehicle Ariane 5 VA-247 lifted off from Kourou Launch Base, French Guiana at 2:31 am (IST) carrying India\u2019s GSAT-31 and Saudi Geostationary Satellite 1\/Hellas Sat 4 satellites. After a 42-min flight, GSAT-31 separated [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":37,"featured_media":309038,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[36],"tags":[10804,10803],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309037"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/users\/37"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=309037"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309037\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":309039,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309037\/revisions\/309039"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/media\/309038"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=309037"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=309037"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=309037"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}