In its annual report to Congress on Tuesday on 'Military and Security Developments Involving the People's Republic of China 2025', the US Department of War said the People's Liberation Army (PLA) is actively considering and planning for additional military facilities.
AzaadiSAT had around 75 small payloads developed by schoolgirls of 75 rural schools.
The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) successfully launched its third and final developmental flight of Small Satellite Launch Vehicle here on Friday whose payloads can be used in applications like satellite-based surveillance, disaster and environmental monitoring, fire detection, volcanic activity among others.
This would be the 44th flight of the PSLV and the third launch by ISRO this year.
The need for NavIC was cemented after India was denied access to crucial navigation data from global providers during the 1999 Kargil War.
The launch marks a significant milestone for the space agency as it is the 50th flight of PSLV and the 75th vehicle mission from Sriharikota. The 628 kg satellite is meant for applications in various fields like agriculture, forestry and disaster management support. It would also serve military purposes.
India's Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle will lift off from Sriharikota on July 10 taking five foreign satellites into orbit, including three earth observation spacecraft whose imagery will be utilised by a Beijing-based company as well as an experimental nano-satellite that will deploy a large, light-weight sail in order to hasten its descent back to earth.
This is ISRO's new record of launching 20 satellites, including those from the US, Germany, Canada and Indonesia.
The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) announced that the fourth edition of the PSLV Orbital platform Experiment Module (POEM-4), used for the space docking experiment mission, has successfully re-entered the Earth's atmosphere. The module, a repurposed spent upper stage of the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle, impacted at 02:33 UTC (08:03 IST) on April 04, 2025, in the Indian Ocean. This successful re-entry signifies ISRO's commitment to mitigating space debris and contributing to the long-term sustainability of the outer space environment. POEM-4 had hosted 24 payloads during its mission life, yielding valuable science data. ISRO and the United States Space Command (USSPACECOM) closely monitored the module's orbit decay and predicted the re-entry date. This event showcases ISRO's proactive approach to responsible space operations.
Aqua, Latin for water, is a NASA Earth Science satellite mission named for the large amount of information that the mission is collecting about the Earth's water cycle, including evaporation from the oceans, water vapor in the atmosphere, clouds, precipitation, soil moisture, sea ice, land ice, and snow cover on the land and ice.
'There's too much coincidence in back-to-back failures of missions critical to national security.'
The polar satellite launch vehicle's 52nd mission is scheduled for lift-off at 15.41 hours on Thursday from the second launch pad at the spaceport of Sriharikota 'subject to weather conditions'.
ISRO has projected wheat production of 122.24 million tonnes.
On Sunday, July 30, 2023, the Indian Space Research Organisation successfully launched its proven Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle rocket carrying seven Singapore satellites from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota and placed them into intended orbits.
This is the first deal by an Indian startup after the sector was opened to private companies in 2020.
The RISAT-2B would replace the RISAT-2, which has been actively used by India to monitor activities in camps across the border in Pakistan to thwart infiltration bids by terrorists.
In a first-of-its-kind initiative involving precision-flying, Indian Space Research Organisation on Thursday successfully launched the Proba-3 mission onboard a PSLV-C59 rocket, a solar experiment undertaken by the European Space Agency.
'The satellite's condition is healthy.'
Other than the Cartosat-2 series satellite, the PSLV is carrying 29 nano satellites from 14 countries - Austria, Belgium, Chile, Czech Republic, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovakia, the United Kingdom and the United States of America besides a nano satellite from India.
The ISRO is strengthening 'eye in the sky', which helped the Indian army carry out surgical strikes last year, with the launch.
ISRO chairman S Somanath said the success gave the space agency "greater confidence," as the GSLV will be next deployed in the NISAR mission, a collaborative effort with the US' NASA.
On Sunday morning, in its mission to place an earth observation satellite and students satellite into the low earth orbit, the SSLV-D1/EOS-02 blasted off precisely at 9.18 am amid cloudy skies from the first launch pad at Satish Dhawan Space Centre in this spaceport.
Thursday's launch is the last one of 2020 for ISRO.
India and Japan have unveiled a comprehensive framework to boost their defence cooperation in response to security challenges, particularly concerning China's increasing military presence in the East and South China Seas.
'The launch of Nila, our very first satellite was very emotional as well as nerve wracking. We tried to calm ourselves by cracking some poor jokes!'
China on Friday announced plans to boost space cooperation with Pakistan, including the development of a space centre and launching of more satellites for its all-weather ally.
Noting that the PSLV was a versatile launch vehicle which can do different jobs and put satellites in different orbits, he said streamlining of this operation with improved capabilities is on.
In the first dedicated mission of its commercial arm New Space India Limited (NSIL), the Indian Space Research Organisation on Sunday successfully launched Brazil's earth observation satellite Amazonia-1 and 18 other co-passengers, including five built by students, onboard a Polar rocket from the spaceport in Sriharikota.
Around 23 minutes after lift-off, the primary satellite got separated and it was followed by six other co-passenger satellites, which were deployed into the intended orbits sequentially, ISRO said.
The Indian Space Research Organisation on Sunday faced a blip in its plan to tap the small satellite launch vehicle market, as an anomaly in the placing of the satellites by the rocket led to deviation on its path thereby becoming 'no longer usable', Chairman S Somanath said on Sunday.
ISRO, in a tweet, said EOS-04 was placed into an intended sun synchronous polar orbit of 529 km altitude at 6.17 am.
Notably, four portfolio companies-- Agnikul, ePlane, CynLr, and GalaxEye -- of deep-tech investor Speciale Invest made it to the list.
Currently, some of the rocket hardware for the human space programme has reached the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota and the integration of the crew module was going on at the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre, Trivandrum, ISRO chairman S Somanath said.
'With India's growing capabilities in the space sector, this creates promising opportunities for enhanced collaboration and market access.'
He said in almost all areas of security-related activities, the space -- earth observation, communication and electronic intelligence, among other things -- plays a very major role.
Over 32 missions -- satellites and rockets -- have been planned for the year.
A 48-hour countdown began on Monday for the launch of record 20 satellites, including India's latest earth observation Cartosat-2 Series Satellite, onboard PSLV C-34 from Sriharikota on June 22.
ISRO's first mission in 2023 and SSLV's sequel saw a strange coincidence--it was launched at 9.18 am, the same time its predecessor lifted off from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre here on August 7, 2022 but could not deliver due to orbit anomaly and flight path deviation.
The six satellites will be launched on PSLV-C29 from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Andhra Pradesh on December 16, 2015.
The Propulsion Module (PM) of Chandrayaan-3 has been moved from an orbit around the Moon to an orbit around Earth, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has said, terming the operation a unique experiment.
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