ISRO is set to launch 5 UK Satellites in Orbit

• ISRO (Indian space research organization) with its commercial arm named Antrix is going to launch five British Satellites that will be carried by Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV ) on 10th july.
• It will be launched from Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC) in Sriharikota.
• The Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV), in its thirtieth flight (PSLV-C28), will launch three identical DMC3 optical earth observation satellites which are built by Surrey Satellite Technology Limited (SSTL), United Kingdom(UK).
• High-end version of PSLV (PSLV-XL) will be used in this launch. Also, the four stage PSLV rocket will start its venture around 10 p.m.
• Apart from it, two other auxiliary satellites are going to be carried with PSVL-C28 which are built in UK.

Those are as follows:-

• CBNT-1, a technology demonstrator earth observation micro satellite built by SSTL.
• De-OrbitSail, a technology demonstrator nano satellite built by Surrey Space Centre.

Weights:-

• Overall lift-off mass of the five satellites is to about 1440 kg.
• CBNT-1 weighs around 91 kg while De-OrbitSail is 7 kg.

Objective:-

• Commercial purpose.
• This is the heaviest commercial mission ever undertaken by Antrix/ISRO.

Challenges:-

• The main challenge was to accommodate the three DMC3 satellites each with a height of about 3 meter within the existing payload fairing of PSLV.
• To mount these satellites onto the launcher called as L-adaptor and a triangular deck called Multiple Satellite Adapter-Version 2 (MSA-V2), were newly designed by ISRO for the first time for this specific purpose.

DMC3:–

• The DMC comprising of three advanced mini-satellites DMC3-1, DMC3-2 and DMC3-3.
• It is designed to address the need for simultaneous high spatial resolution and high temporal resolution optical Earth Observation.
• With a separation of 120° between them in a single Low-Earth Orbit plane, these satellites can image any target on the Earth’s surface every day.

Applications:-

• To Survey the resources on earth and its environment.
• To manage urban infrastructure and monitoring of disasters.

Abbreviations 

• Indian space research organization-ISRO
• Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle –PSLV
• Satish Dhawan Space Centre-SDSC
• Surrey Satellite Technology Limited-SSTL