Arianespace Launched Its 3rd Satellite—Report
Launch provider in Europe, Arianespace has been successful in their 3rd launch of 2019 on March 21st. The mission was conducted on a Vega rocket for Space Agency in Italy. Arianespace’s light-lift vehicle named Vega was launched from Kourou at French Guiana sharply at 9:50 p.m. PRecursore Iper Spettrale della Missione Applicativa Satellite, commonly known as PRISMA got automatically detached from the main body of the rocket after 54 minutes. This mission is just the first one of the four Vega missions in line for 2019. In case the launches are not rescheduled or cancelled due to unwanted circumstances, this year would be the one with maximum number of Vega launches since 2012, its debut year.
The original scheduled date for launch of PRISMA was in 2018. However, there were some issues with Aeolus wind mapping satellite of the European Space Agency, which is why, Vega got delayed and the launch date got postponed to 2019. Italian Space Agency named ASI made a list of companies in Italy who can help in carrying out the PRISMA mission.
Finally, Italian aerospace collaborated with OHB Italia and a defense company named Leonardo for manufacturing the satellite weighing 879 kilograms. Leonardo was responsible for providing power supply, electro-optical payload and the solar panels. A joint contract was made between Leonardo and Thales Group, based in Paris. The name of the contract was Thales Alenia Space which gave PRISMA the system of onboard data transmission. OHB Italia also helped in managing everything for the launch. Italian Space Agency regards PRISMA as the most capable operative hyperspectral tool around the globe. The functioning years for PRISMA is 5. ASI mentioned that the satellite would be helpful in reading the environmental behavior like changes in climate, changes occurred due to human interference etc. ASI also informed that these data would be helpful in preventing natural disasters etc.