GSAT-6A Satellite Located, ISRO Working to Re-Establish Contact

ISRO chairman Dr K Sivan said that they now know the exact position of the satellite and are keeping a close watch.

Sriharikota: GSAT-6A satellite ascends into the sky from the second launch pad at Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota, Andhra Pradesh on 29 March 2018.

(Photo: IANS)

Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) has sucesfully located communication satellite GSAT-6A with which the link got snapped soon after its launch last month, reported the Times of India (TOI).

ISRO chairman Dr K Sivan told TOI that they now know the exact position of the satellite and were keeping a close watch.

“With the help of the satellite tracking system and other sources, we now know the exact location of GSAT-6A. Earlier, we were searching in the dark. But now we know the exact position of the satellite and keeping a close watch on its movement round-the-clock. We are hopeful that at a particular orientation, it will capture the signal from the ground station and communication will be restored. Currently, GSAT-6A is moving in the geo transfer orbit at perigee of around 26,000km and apogee of about 33,000km,” Sivan told TOI.

He further said that the team was working towards re-establishing links to the satellite.

According to IANS, ISRO had lost connection with GSAT-6A on 1 April after its launch on 29 March, on board the Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) from its spaceport in Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh, 80 km northeast of Chennai.

The satellite was to be placed in its intended orbit 36,000 km above ground level after three orbit-raising manoeuvres from the space agency's Master Control Facility (MCF) at Hassan in Karnataka, about 180 km from Bengaluru.

With a life span of 10 years, the satellite, worth over Rs 240 crore, is meant to provide a platform for developing technologies that could be useful in satellite-based mobile communication applications.

(With inputs from TOI and IANS)