ISRO gears up to launch an Indian spy satellite, 9 foreign satellites on December 11

The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) is gearing up to launch the country's latest spy satellite RISAT-2BR1 as well as nine foreign satellites on December 11. ISRO's workhorse – the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) rocket will carry the satellites to space. According to the Indian space agency, the rocket numbered as PSLV-C48 will lift off at 3.25 pm on Wednesday with RISAT-2BR1, a radar imaging earth observation satellite weighing about 628 kg.

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Indian satellite to have 9 foreign peers aboard PSLV

The rocket will blast off from the First Launch Pad (FLP) of Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC) SHAR in Andhra Pradesh's Sriharikota and place RISAT-2BR1 into an orbit of 576 km in space. The spy satellite will have a life of five years. The Indian satellite would be accompanied by nine foreign peers from the United States (multi-mission Lemur-4 satellites, technology demonstration Tyvak-0129, earth imaging 1HOPSAT), Israel (remote sensing Duchifat-3), Italy (search and rescue Tyvak-0092) and Japan (QPS-SAR - a radar imaging earth observation satellite). These international customer satellites are being launched under a commercial arrangement with NewSpace India Limited (NSIL).

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ISRO's PSLV-QL variant rocket

According to the ISRO, the satellites will be carried by the PSLV-QL variant and have four strap-on boosters with a combined propellant load of 48 tonnes. The December 11 flight will be the second space trip for this specific variant. The rocket, just over 16 minutes into its flight, will sling RISAT-2BR1 and a minute later the first of the nine customer satellites will be ejected. The launch mission is expected to conclude in about 21 minutes when the last of the customer satellites will be put into orbit.

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