Science News Desk – Taking a major step towards building US-India ties in civil-space cooperation, the Indian Space Agency (ISRO) has developed a special satellite in collaboration with the American space agency NASA (NASA). This Nisar satellite, prepared at a cost of about Rs 10,000 crore, was developed in NASA. It reached Bengaluru on Wednesday. ISRO chief Dr. S. Somnath himself went to take it to NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. The special thing about this satellite is that it will give information about natural events like earthquake, avalanche, sea storm etc. in advance. It is being considered as the biggest joint science mission of India and America so far.
A C-17 transport aircraft of the US Air Force reached Bengaluru carrying this NASA-ISRO satellite. The satellite and its payload have been tested several times. ISRO will launch it next year. Before this, some necessary changes have to be made in it. It will be launched from ISRO’s most powerful GSLV-Mk2 rocket. Nisar satellite is being described as the world’s costliest earth observation satellite.
This satellite will give advance information about tornadoes, hurricanes, volcanoes, earthquakes, melting of glaciers, sea storms, forest fires, sea level rise, farming, wet land, less snow etc. Information about the garbage and dangers accumulating around the earth will also be available from satellites coming from space towards the earth. Not only this, this satellite will keep an eye on the increasing and decreasing number of trees and plants on the earth. Information about the decrease and increase of light will also be available from Nisar. India’s space agency ISRO will use the satellite to monitor glaciers in the Himalayas and landslide-prone areas.
The weight of this SUV-sized satellite is about 2800 kg. It carries both L and S-band Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) devices. Its radar will be so powerful that it will be able to take very clear pictures of the area up to 240 km. It will again take a picture of any place on the earth after 12 days. Because it will take 12 days to complete one round of the earth. During this, it will continue to provide pictures and data scientists by rapidly sampling different parts of the earth.