A side view of the GSLV-Mark III. (ISRO)
The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) will launch 31 satellites on a single rocket. The 28-hour countdown to the launch of these satellites on Friday began this morning at 05:29 am. Out of the 31 satellites that are being launched, two are Indian and the remaining 29 belong to other countries.
The Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV), in its 40th flight, will launch the 712 kg Cartosat-2 series satellite for earth observation and 30 co-passenger satellites together weighing about 243 kg at lift-off into a 505 km sun synchronous orbit.
PSLV-C38 will be launched from the first launchpad of Satish Dhawan Space Centre SHAR, Sriharikota. This will be the seventeenth flight of PSLV in 'XL' configuration (with the use of solid strap-on motors).
The 29 foreign nano satellites are being launched as part of an arrangement between Antrix Corporation Limited, a government of India company that functions as ISRO’s commercial arm, and international customers from 14 countries, namely Austria, Belgium, Chile, Czech Republic, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovakia, UK and the US.
With inputs from ANI
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