ISRO to launch satellite mission with NASA, get more research facilities

The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) will jointly realise a satellite mission with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) — NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar (NISAR) — to conduct scientific studies of the Earth, Union Minister Jitendra Singh told Lok Sabha. Singh was responding to over upcoming ISRO space missions in 2022 in the House. He added that the Centre intended to set up more research facilities across the country to extend support to the space agency’s research. Singh said the existing Space Technology Incubation Centre, Regional Academic Centre for Space would get a grant of Rs 2 crore a year and proposed new cells would also adopt the same guidelines.

“Government pursues collaborative projects with foreign space research organisations with the objectives of enhancing the capacity of the Indian space programme for advancing programmatic priorities, augmenting space science and earth observation database, widening ground station networks, bettering products and services through joint experiments and creating platforms for inflow of expertise,” Singh said.

ISRO will also get a second space port. It picked Kulasekarapattinam in Tamil Nadu in December 2019 to build its second space port and realize India’s ambition of being a top player in space exploration. By September 2020, the Tamil Nadu government identified 2,300 for the project, with 50% of the land already being handed over to ISRO.

In a related development, ISRO will send an expert team to Pawanpur village in Maharashtra’s Chandrapur district to investigate what is believed to be remnants of a Chinese rocket.

“Inputs from several sources are received on the mysterious flashing light seen in the sky during evening hours on April 3…,” the space agency said in a post on its Facebook page.

“It is reported that a metal ring and a cylinder-like object was found in an open field in Pawanpur village. As requested by the district administration, a team of scientists form ISRO is visiting Pawanpur for inspection and further scientific enquiry.”

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