On the
face, it looked like just another routine launch of India's work
horse PSLV rocket, on 28th March 2015, 27th
one to be precise. On board was a satellite weighing 1425 Kg, to be
put in a geosynchronous orbit around the earth. This has been a
fairly routine launch from all respects, yet it marked an important
milestone for India.
This
is so, because the satellite on board, named as IRNSS 1D, when in its
position 36000 Km above earth, would be able to start, though in a
rudimentary fashion, The Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System
(IRNSS) designed to provide precise location- and time-based
services to a variety of users on land, sea and air across the Indian
region.
This
system, eventually will have 7 satellites looking at India, yet
technically only 4 are enough to start the positioning system. IRNSS
would form an independent regional navigation satellite system
designed to provide position accuracy better than 10 meters over
India and over the region extending to about 1500 Km around India. It
will provide an accurate real time Position, Navigation and Time
(PNT) services to users on a variety of platforms with 24x7 service
availability under all weather conditions. In simple terms, IRNSS
would be an independent positioning system like GPS that will give
data on the position, navigation and time of persons or objects to a
range of users. Aircraft can use the IRNSS satellites to know their
position while cruising or during landing approach. Ships can use
this system to navigate towards their destination and while entering
harbours. Individual drivers of cars and trucks, can find their exact
position with a receiver inside the vehicle. IRNSS is likely to be
invaluable for the defense users.
At
present, U.S., Russia, Europe, Japan and China have set up such
satellite constellations. GPS set up by US is well known. Russia has
its own GLONASS and the Europeans have built Galileo constellation.
These are global navigation satellites, which can be used by anybody
anywhere in the world with the help of a receiver.
Question
arises as to why India needs its own navigation system then! The
answer to this lies in a little historical episode of 1999. In this
year, Pakistani troops had invaded in Kargil and India needed some
vital GPS information. India requested US, which controls GPS, to
furnish that information. But to Its dismay, India found its request
denied. A decision was taken then to have own Indian navigation
system, which would make all data of military importance always
available to the country. The IRNSS system is therefore planned as a
regional navigation system that shall provide positional information
to users only in India and the region around its borders. In simple
terms, IRNSS would be an independent positioning system like GPS that
will give data on the position, navigation and time of persons or
objects to a range of users in the Indian sub continent. Its users
will be from aerospace, military, all transport systems,
geo-information of the Survey of India and also individual users. Two
basic services would be available as standard Positioning Service
(SPS,) one for common civilian users and second one for Restricted
Service (RS) for special authorized users.
The
first satellite from IRNSS constellation IRNSS-A was put into orbit
on July 1, 2013. This was followed by IRNSS-B, which was launched on
4th April 2014. ISRO put the third satellite into an orbit on 16th
October 2014. The launch on 28th March 2015, completes the
skeletal set up requirement for IRNSS system to start functioning
about in a months time.
ISRO
Chairman K.S. Kiran Kumar rightly says that “We will now be able to
make use of our receivers to locate ourselves independently.” He
explained that while the ambit of the U.S. GPS was global, the IRNSS
was meant for regional coverage and added, replying to a query. “The
globe comes later, the country comes first.”
2nd
April 2015
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