ISRO Chairman K Sivan offers prayers at Tirupati ahead of PSLV's 50th mission

Tirumala: Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) chairman Dr K Sivan offered prayers at the revered Tirupati Balaji temple on Tuesday morning here before the launch of satellites from PSLV C48 scheduled for tomorrow.

While speaking to media, he said that PSLV C48 is a historic achievement by ISRO as this is the 50th launch for PSLV and 75th launch from Sriharikota. ISRO is gearing up for the launch of RISAT-2BR1 through PSLV C48, which will launch it from Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC) in Sriharikota on December



11.

PSLV-C48 will also carry 9 customer satellites including one from Israel, one from Italy, one from Japan and six from the USA as “co-passengers”. The countdown for PSLV C48 will start today afternoon at 1.25 pm. The satellites including RISAT-2BR1 will be launched tomorrow at 3.25 pm.

According to the space agency, RISAT-2BR1, a Radar imaging earth observation satellite weighing about 628 kg, will be placed into an orbit of 576 km at an inclination of 37 degrees.