Two satellites launched from India will provide ship and oil spill monitoring using radar imaging technology
UK-based Surrey Satellite Technology has confirmed the successful launch of two satellites that will provide high resolution surveillance of the world’s oceans for oil spills and illegal maritime activities.
Satellites NovaSAR-1 and SSTL S1-4 were launched from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota, India on 16 September. They have been deployed into a sun-synchronous orbit at 580 km above the Earth by Antrix Corp on an Indian Space Research Organisation launch vehicle.
NovaSAR-1 is the first synthetic aperture radar (SAR) satellite to be manufactured entirely in the UK and will test S-band radar for remote sensing and ship monitoring. SAR can view the Earth night and day and provide images through clouds.
Surrey Satellite Technology said the SAR payload on NovaSAR-1 has a dedicated maritime mode for monitoring the marine environment over a swath area of 400 km. It also has dedicated technology for monitoring shipping activity.
It will provide direct radar ship detection information simultaneously with automatic identification system (AIS) ship tracking data.
NovaSAR-1 has three additional imaging modes for other applications, such as flood monitoring, agricultural and forestry applications.
NovaSAR-1 was designed and manufactured by Surrey Satellite Technology, while the S-band SAR payload was developed by Airbus Defence and Space and the AIS receiver as supplied by Honeywell Aerospace.
SSTL S1-4 satellite is an Earth observation satellite similar to three TripleSat constellation satellites launched in 2015. It will be used for agricultural monitoring, land classification, natural resource management and disaster monitoring using a high resolution imager on board the spacecraft.
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