A powerful satellite, developed by India and the United States, must be launched on Wednesday to list the terrestrial and minute glaciers changes in order to anticipate the natural risks and those caused by humans.
Called Nisar, the satellite, which is the size of a van, is to take off at 5:40 p.m. local time (12:10 p.m. GMT) from the Step Center de Sagé Dhawan, on the south-eastern coast of India.
Much awaited by scientists, this mission is considered an important step in strengthening the relations between India Narendra Modi and the United States of Donald Trump.
Its objective is to map “the surface of our planet” and “its constant and significant changes,” said Karen St. Germain, head of the NASA earth science department, the American space agency.
“Some changes are made slowly. Others suddenly. Some are substantial, when others are subtle,” she said.
With the ability to detect these tiny changes, of the order of one centimeter, scientists will be able to detect the warning signs of natural disasters and of human origin, such as earthquakes, landslides, volcanic eruptions or even the aging of infrastructure such as dams or bridges.
– “most sophisticated radar” –
“We will observe the formation of the earth and the movement, the swelling, the transformation and the melting of mountain glaciers and glacial caps that cover Greenland and Antarctica. And, of course, we will also see the forest fires”, underlined Karen St. Germain, calling the Nisar “the most sophisticated radar” that the United States has ever built.
Equipped with a 12 -meter parabolic antenna which will be deployed in space, the satellite will photograph near the entire earth’s surface and its glacial surfaces twice every 12 days, since its 747 kilometers of altitude.
NASA and the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) shared the workload, building each of the components of the satellite, before testing it in southern India.
NASA contributed to the project up to $ 1.2 billion when the ISRO spent around $ 90 million.
The Indian space program has evolved considerably in recent years, in particular by placing an orbit probe around Mars in 2014 and by placing a robot and a rover on the moon in 2023.
India also sent an astronaut for the first time, Shubhanshu Shukla, staying in the International Space Station (ISS), a key step towards its first independent inhabited mission, scheduled for 2027 as part of the Gaganyaan program (“Celeste”).
Posted on July 30 at 07:34 am, AFP
