ISRO's GSAT-N2 Satellite Successfully Placed In Orbit By SpaceX

India's latest communication satellite GSAT-N2 was successfully launched into orbit by Elon Musk's SpaceX, ISRO's commercial arm NewSpace India Ltd. said on Tuesday.

SpaceX had successfully launched the Indian GSAT-20 communication satellite from Cape Canaveral, Florida. GSAT-N2 was then successfully injected into the desired orbit after 34 minutes of flight, NSIL said in a statement.

"After nearly 34 minutes of flight, GSAT-N2 got successfully injected into its intended super Geo-Synchronous Transfer Orbit with Perigee of 250 km, Apogee of 59,730 km and 27.5 degree inclination," said NSIL.

The 4,700 kg communication satellite on-board Falcon 9 launcher is the second demand driven mission of NSIL.

After the separation of the satellite ISRO's Master Control Facility at Hassan, India took control of the satellite. Based on the initial data received, the satellite is in good health, added NSIL. In the coming days the orbit of GSAT-N2 will be raised from GTO to Geo-Stationary Orbit through a series of orbit rising manoeuvres, using satellite's on-board chemical propulsion system.

“The successful launch of GSAT-N2 by NSIL marks the beginning of the commercially competitive satellite capacity solutions being available to Indian VSAT operators, for meeting the country’s Broadband and IFMC service needs,” said Radhakrishnan D, chairman and managing director of NSIL.

GSAT-N2 has a mission life of 14 years and is equipped with 32 spot beams that will provide pan India coverage including data on A&N and Lakshadweep islands. It also comprises eight narrow spot beams over the Northeast region and 24 wide spot beams over the rest of India. GSAT-N2 is an HTS satellite with a capacity of 48 Gbps.

This collaboration between ISRO and SpaceX was necessitated by the satellite’s size, which was too heavy for ISRO’s current fleet of launch vehicles. While India’s LVM-3 rocket is capable of lifting payloads of up to 4,000 kg into Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit, the GSAT-20 surpassed this capacity, compelling ISRO to seek external help.