India Struggling to Establish Lost Link With Crucial Communication Satellite

The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has said it has not given up on the recently launched GSAT-6A that went missing ahead of the third and final course correction firing on April 1.

The communication satellite was launched on March 29 this year from the spaceport Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh.

"The scientists completed the second orbit raising operation of GSAT-6A on Saturday and when it was on course to the normal operating configuration for the third and final firing for course correction scheduled for April 1 communication with the satellite was lost," ISRO said in a release on its portal.

Since then, the space agency has maintained unusual silence on the state of the satellite.

"Usually when these types of disturbances come, the satellite will go into safe mode, then we establish the link and put the satellite back, but now we are not able to link, and the process of re-establishing the link is going on," ISRO Chairman K Sivan told the Press Trust of India.

The 2,140-kg weighing GSAT-6A was launched using the ISRO's powerful geosynchronous rocket (GSLV-F08) fitted with an indigenous cryogenic engine at the third stage and was put into orbit successfully after the launch in what was described by a senior ISRO official as a "magnificent mission."

Source: Sputnik News

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