Chennai, Nov 17 – Dr. Laurie Leshin, Director of Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), USA, visited ISRO and engaged in discussions with ISRO Chief Dr. S. Somanath regarding the readiness of the Indo-US Joint satellite NISAR mission.
The mission, anticipated to take place in the first quarter of the coming year, was a focal point of the meeting held at ISRO headquarters in Bengaluru. Dr. Laurie Leshin expressed satisfaction with the collaborative efforts of JPL and ISRO officials working as a unified team at ISRO’s U R Rao Satellite Centre (URSC) in realizing the ‘NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar (NISAR).
The meeting covered NISAR’s readiness for launch and explored potential opportunities for future cooperation, including professional exchange in technical areas and space exploration, as reported by ISRO.
NASA and ISRO are collaborating on the NASA-ISRO SAR Mission (NISAR), a significant Earth-observing mission. Planned for an early 2024 launch from the Satish Dhawan Space Center, SHAR Range in Sriharikota, NISAR will orbit Earth in a near-polar orbit at an altitude of 747 km with an inclination of 98.4 deg. ISRO will deploy its GSLV-MkII/LMV, the heaviest homegrown rocket, for the mission.
NISAR aims to measure Earth’s changing ecosystems, dynamic surfaces, and ice masses, providing crucial information about biomass, natural hazards, sea level rise, and groundwater. The mission will observe Earth’s land and ice-covered surfaces globally with 12-day regularity on ascending and descending passes, providing valuable data for a range of applications.
