Your behavior appears to be a little unusual. Please verify that you are not a bot.


IRNSS-1A Reaches Preliminary Destination Orbit

July 11, 2013  - By
Image: GPS World

News courtesy of CANSPACE listserv.

Following the July 1 launch of the Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System 1A satellite, five orbit maneuvers were to be conducted by the master control facility to position the satellite in its circular inclined geosynchronous orbit (IGSO) with an equator crossing at 55 degrees east longitude.

Reports indicate that orbit raising maneuvers have been completed with a fifth apogee motor firing on July 6 at 16:57 IST or 11:27 UTC. All the spacecraft subsystems have been evaluated and are functioning normally.

The satellite was reported to be in IGSO with a 27 degree inclination at 44 degrees east longitude.

NORAD/JSpOC has released a two-line element set for the IGSO of the satellite with an epoch of a few days ago:

1 39199U 13034A   13189.83931637  .00000103  00000-0  00000+0 0    55
2 39199 027.0197 141.0618 0046168 179.3431 315.7902 01.00666774   276

This data indicates that the sub-satellite equator crossing was about 47 degrees east longitude at the reference epoch. The satellite orbit equator crossing is drifting eastwards and should reach 55 degrees east longitude by about July 14.

This article is tagged with , and posted in GNSS, Latest News

1 Comment on "IRNSS-1A Reaches Preliminary Destination Orbit"

Trackback | Comments RSS Feed

  1. Crazy Motts says:

    This is truly great news. I would like to add to the discussion, my findings during a simulation-based analysis of IRNSS and IRNSS-1A. I used STK to simulate the constellation configurations possible and estimate its life expectancy and orbital decay patterns. Here’s the link to the analysis report:

    http://crazymotts.blogspot.in/2013/08/irnss-analysis-of-opportunities-and.html