ISRO's PSLV-C55 successfully launches 2 Singapore satellites into orbit

The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) on Saturday (April 22) successfully placed two Singapore satellites into the intended orbit.

The satellites are part of the order secured by NewSpace India Ltd, the commercial arm of ISRO.

At the end of a 22.5 hour countdown, the 44.4 metre tall rocket lifted off majestically from the first launch pad at the pre-fixed 2.19 pm at the Satish Dhawan Space Centre here, located about 135 km from Chennai.

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“The launch of the PSLV-C55/TeLEOS-2 is launched successfully on April 22, 2023 at 14:19 hours IST from SDSC-SHAR, Sriharikota,” ISRO said in a statement.

“This is a dedicated commercial mission through NSIL with TeLEOS-2 as primary satellite and Lumelite-4 as a co-passenger satellite. The satellites weigh about 741 kg and 16 kg, respectively. Both belong to Singapore. They are intended to be launched into an Eastward low inclination orbit,” it added.

“PSLV- C55/TeLEOS-2 mission is accomplished successfully. In a textbook launch, the vehicle placed TeLEOS-2 and LUMELITE-4 satellites precisely into their intended 586 km circular orbit,” ISRO tweeted.

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TeLEOS-2

The TeLEOS-2 satellite is developed under a partnership between DSTA (representing the Government of Singapore) and ST Engineering. Once deployed and operational, it will be used to support the satellite imagery requirements of various agencies within the Government of Singapore. TeLEOS-2 carries a Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) payload. TeLEOS-2 will be able to provide all-weather day and night coverage, and capable of imaging at 1m full-polarimetric resolution.

LUMILITE-4

The LUMELITE-4 satellite is co-developed by the Institute for Infocomm Research (I2R) of A*STAR and Satellite Technology and Research Centre (STAR) of the National University of Singapore. LUMELITE4 is an advanced 12U satellite developed for the technological demonstration of the High-Performance Space-borne VHF Data Exchange System (VDES). Using the VDES communication payload developed by I2R and STAR’s scalable satellite bus platform, it aims to augment Singapore’s e-navigation maritime safety and benefit the global shipping community.

POEM-2

The mission has the PSLV Orbital Experimental Module (POEM), where the spent PS4 stage of the launch vehicle would be utilized as an orbital platform to carryout scientific experiments through non-separating payloads. The payloads belong to ISRO/Department of Space, Bellatrix, Dhruva Space, and the Indian Institute of Astrophysics.

PSLV- C55/TeLEOS-2 mission is accomplished successfully.

In a textbook launch, the vehicle placed TeLEOS-2 and LUMELITE-4 satellites precisely into their intended 586 km circular orbit.@NSIL_India@PIB_India

— ISRO (@isro) April 22, 2023

PSLV-C55/TeLEOS-2 Mission

The launch can be watched live
today from 13:45 Hrs. IST on https://t.co/x5l80heWWs https://t.co/zugXQAYy1yhttps://t.co/e5izHubgtq @DDNational pic.twitter.com/258InkK460

— ISRO (@isro) April 22, 2023