ISRO successful in sweeping off space debris, De orbits defunct satellite
Megha-Tropiques-1, launched into Low Earth Orbit (LEO) in October 2011, was successfully deorbited by ISRO after completion of its mission
India has been vocal regarding the issues of space junk surrounding Earth and how it has made observations difficult and even increased the risk of collisions in zero gravity.
Now it has taken an active step in rightful direction by carrying out sweeping off of Space Debris . The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) on Tuesday successfully de-orbited a satellite after its end of mission. Megha-Trophiques-1 was brought down from its orbit as it disintegrated and burned up in the skies above the Pacific Ocean.
ISRO tweeted, “The controlled re-entry experiment for the decommissioned Megha-Tropiques-1 (MT-1) was carried out successfully on March 7, 2023.”
Megha-Tropiques-1 was launched into Low Earth Orbit (LEO) on October 12, 2011, as a joint mission developed by ISRO and the French space agency, CNES, for tropical weather and climate studies. The mission was initially planned to operate for three years, but it was extended later as it continued to deliver key data about the climate for a decade.
ISRO crashed the satellite as part of its commitment to the United Nations Inter-Agency Space Debris Coordination Committee (UNIADC) following the end of the mission life.
The UN guidelines state that at its end-of-life the satellite should be deorbited, preferably through controlled re-entry to a safe impact zone, or by bringing it to an orbit where the orbital lifetime is less than 25 years.
ISRO said Megha-Tropiques-1 still had about 125kg of onboard fuel, which was estimated to be sufficient to achieve a fully controlled atmospheric re-entry.
