ISRO loses connection with GSAT-6A - Fusion - WeRIndia

On August 31st of last year, the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) saw the PSLV fail to launch the IRNSS-1H satellite.

Now, this is the first time that the ISRO have seen failure since the failed launch of the IRNSS-1H satellite.

On the morning of April 1st, 2018, the GSAT-6A satellite lost connection with the ISRO, 60 hours after its launch.

The connection with the satellite was lost before it could be put into its orbit.

People are currently putting in effort to reestablish contact with the satellite.

The ISRO has also formed an 11-member committee, headed by P. S. Goel, a satellite expert.

This committee was formed to find out where things went wrong with the satellite connection.

On Thursday, the GSAT-6A satellite was launched on the back of the GSLV rocket from the Satish Dhawan Space Center in Sriharikota.

The launch went very well, and people expected the entire operation to go smoothly.

The satellite was supposed to be placed in orbit in three phases, since a satellite is kept closer to the Earth after it is launched.

In every phase, a satellite goes through a number of maneuvers called orbit-raising, in which it is brought farther away from the Earth. When a satellite does orbit raising, a series of small engines called thrusters make alterations in the flight path.

They eventually bring the satellite to its final orbit around the Earth.

However, on the morning of April 1st, the ISRO announced that communication with the GSAT-6A satellite was lost.

The satellite was on course to go into its third and final firing, when the ISRO lost communication with it.

K. Sivan, chief of the ISRO, said that there was a power system anomaly with the GSAT-6A satellite.

Despite the failure of this satellite, however, the ISRO will be continuing with its currently scheduled launches.

The Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle is one of these upcoming launches, which is scheduled for April 12th.

Image credit: Photo by SpaceX on Unsplash (Free for commercial use)

Image Reference: https://unsplash.com/photos/VBNb52J8Trk