Chennai : India has another of its satellite, EMISAT, in orbit now after its successful launch on Monday morning from the Sriharikota launch station in Andhra Pradesh. This satellite will emit electronic intelligence to the defence forces.

It is for the first time that the country’s defence forces will be getting this kind of intelligence, being described as a technological prowess not acquired by many nations.

Addressing a crowded press conference after the successful launch of the ISRO’s Emisat Satellite and another 28 satellites belonging to different customers, ISRO chairman K Sivan said, “Today the PSLV has successfully injected ISRO made Emisat satellite and 28 customer satellites at 504 km altitude. “

He described the mission as a special one for ISRO.

“The mission is special for ISRO on many counts as it was the first time a PSLV rocket is launched with four strap-on motors; it was the first time the mission has three different orbits; it was the first time the fourth stage is made an orbital platform for experiments and there is a new team for PSLV,” Sivan said adding that the private industry also contributed a lot for the building of the rocket and satellite.

“Ninety-five percent of the rocket hardware and 60-65 percent of satellite components were fabricated by the industry,” he said.

According to Sivan, heeding to the demand of the common man to view the rocket launches, a viewers gallery was built and 1,200 people enjoyed the launch on Monday.

He said, for the next mission about 5,000 people will be allowed to witness the launch and the number will be increased to 10,000

Sivan said under the outreach programme a total of 108 from each state and union territories will be visiting ISRO and get trained for 15 days so that they gain experience in space technology.

As regards future missions, Sivan said the next PSLV rocket will carry RISAT-2BR and it will be followed by another PSLV launch carrying Cartosat-3 satellite.

In the morning after the blast off, the PSLV launch vehicle ferried the four-stage rocket at 9.27 a.m. from the second launch pad at the spaceport of Sriharikota.vEMISAT was released first 17 minutes into the launch at an orbit 749 km away. The small satellites were to be released after about 40 minutes at a lower orbit of 504 km.

The countdown for the project began on Sunday on board Indian Space Research Organisation’s third generation workhorse Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV), in its 47th flight, ISRO said.