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RS : November - December 1999
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INSAT-3B launch in mid-Feb 2000
Town Atlas for NCR planning board
ISRO plans mission to the moon
US private companies to collect Aerial Data
IKONOS snaps pictures of higher resolution
Britain's Map on Internet
INSAT-3B launch in mid-Feb 2000
INSAT-3B, the next dedicated telecommunications satellite on which several
hundred domestic and corporate VSAT users are pinning their hopes, will now be
launched on or around Feb. 15, 2000 against its previous launch date in
Oct.-Nov. ‘99. INSAT–3B, assembled at the ISRO Satellite Centre (ISAC) here, has
been waiting for a launch slot with European launch services major, Araine
space. ISRO has chosen this relatively new European rocket Ariane-5 as the
vehicle for launching. The delay in giving a launch date was apparently due
teething troubles the new rocket had.
The 2070-kg 3B will be the fifth
passenger on the new generation rocket, designated 505. It will also be the
first of the Generation 3 satellites planned till 2001-2002. The INSAT 3B itself
will enhance transponder capacity by 70. It will have seven transponders in the
extended C-band and three in Ku band. On becoming operational, it will increase
the transponder capacity to around 85, while the current and growing demand is
for 90-100 transponders
Town Atlas for NCR planning board
NRSA has taken up a project for the National Capital Region Planning Board. This
project covers the NCR area spread over five states. The project will be carried
out using Remote Sensing technique. For this purpose, about 77 PAN+LISS merged
products on 1:50,000 scale, 183 PAN+LISS merged products on 1:25,000 covering 41
mapsheets and 179 PAN+LISS products on 1:12,500 scale are being generated. It is
planned to prepare a town atlas for 22 towns coming under the Capital region.
Landuse maps of the region will be generated using 1:50,000 scale images.
ISRO plans mission to the moon
The Indian Space Research Organi- sation has begun preliminary studies to assess
the feasibility of under taking a mission to moon. ISRO’s satellite Centre
director, Mr. Goel said that the study would cover the scientific benefits,
which could be derived from the lunar mission and to see if any new technologies
should be incorporated in the project. He said that ISRO study is also expected
to evaluate two alternatives concerning the mission. These are whether a space
craft should be made to land on the moon surface or just use a remote sensing
satellite which will not land on the lunar surface but will fly around the moon
and transmit information to ISRO for carrying our scientific studies. Mr. Goel
said that ISRO’s PSLV is a proven rocket and has the capability to fly upto
lunar orbit. Studies show that the flight from earth to moon will be covered in
four and half days. He further said that the Geosynchronous Satellite Launch
Vehicle can also fly upto moon’s orbit, but it has to be first declared
operational. If India’s mission succeeds, it will be joining the US, and former
Soviet Union in making its presence felt in lunar orbit.
US private companies to collect Aerial Data
Under a programme christened as Environmental Research Aircraft Sensor
Technology (ERAST), four private companies of US have come up with an
inexpensive way to collect aerial data and photographs for commercial use. These
companies are working in close co-ordination with NASA, which is only acting as
a “midwife” to the birth of these new auto-pilot aircraft systems. These four
private companies have built their own respective aircrafts called: (a) Helios
(b) Proteus (c) Altus II (d) Perseus B.
Helios is a remote
controlled glittering blade of solar panels and will remain 30,480m above the
earth’s surface for up to six months at a time. Proteus has two sets of
wings and striking, snake-like head. Altus II looks like a beefed-up
cruise missile. These aircrafts require low investments and are designed for
high-altitude,long-duration telecommuni-cations or science missions. The
respective companies hope to pitch their crafts as cheap alternatives to their
high-flying satellite cousins.
Deployed high above the clouds, the
aircraft’s could peer into the heart of tropical storms, helping scientists
better understand them. Outfitted with powerful telescopes, they might be able
to snap the first pictures of planets in the other solar systems. According to
Mr. Ray Morgan, vice-president of AeroVironment Inc, which makes the Helios,
envisions fleets of such craft circling major cities carrying telecommunications
gear to deliver high-speed wireless services for a fraction of the cost of
satellite systems. They will cost just $3 millions to $5 millions each, compared
to around $100 millions to build and launch a satellite
IKONOS snaps pictures of higher resolution
The satellite, named Ikonos, is now in a polar orbit, eventually covering every
spot on earth as the globe revolves beneath it, orbiting the world every 98
minutes. The photos have resolution of 1m, so even an amateur photo analyst can
distinguish a car from a bus, an armoured tank and a truck, a military plane and
a commercial airliner. The company that sells the image now has applied for US
Government to take and sell photography with a resolution of half a metre, which
makes it precise enough to discern images of people. Cameras are now available
for some commercial applications that have a resolution of 10 cm.
The
commercial applications are obvious. Ranchers can check their crops, even their
cattle. Among the government applications are like checking the amount of water
in the soil (which can be ascertained by evaluating different shadings),
progress of insect infestations or plant diseases and the best spot to build a
water control project. However, it is its military applications which is
troubling the authorities
Britain's Map on Internet
A bird’s
eye view of Britain on the threshold of a new millennium
has been captured on the film so that every town,
street, field and cowshed can be found on a giant
Internet map. The snapshot of Britain, frozen in time,
was created by the Millennium Map Company which sent
four planes up to photograph the first complete aerial
survey of the country. The first shot of England will be
available on the information superhighway in January,
with Scotland and Wales following suit by the end of
2001. The map shows the nation in such a way that
objects as small as 25 cm can be viewed in
high-resolution photographs. Computer users will be able
to download detailed images from the internet site for
about $16 each. Half of the map will be online in
January, and the rest should be available by the end of
2001, the company said. The website is http://www.milleniummap.com
.
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