Isro saved satellites from potential collision 10 times in 2024
Photo/Agencies
NEW DELHI: Isro successfully performed 10 Collision Avoidance Manoeuvres (CAMs) in 2024 to protect its satellites from potential collision with other objects in space, according to the newly released
Indian Space Situational Assessment Report
(ISSAR) for 2024.
The space agency performs Space Situational Awareness (SSA) activities to protect national space assets from space environmental hazards, such as resident space objects, including space debris, natural objects like asteroids and meteoroids, energy and particle flux.
Last year, 89 manoeuvre plans were revised to avoid post-manoeuvre close approaches with other space objects for low earth orbit (LEO) satellites. On two occasions, manoeuvre plans had to be revised to avoid post-manoeuvre conjunctions for Geostationary earth orbit (GEO) satellites, it said.
Overall, Isro has carried out 122 CAMs for its earth-orbiting satellites in the last 14 years. The agency said more than 53,000 alerts issued by Combined Space Operations Center of US Space Command for Isro's earth-orbiting satellites were analysed using more accurate orbital data from flight dynamics.
Data shows that between 2010 and 2024, 122 CAMs were conducted and a maximum 23 were carried out between 2022 and 2023. Between 2023 and 2024, there were 10 CAMs.
'The number of CAMs was less in 2024 compared to the previous year. This is because improved close approach analysis methodology with larger conjunction screening volume and usage of more accurate ephemerides helped to meet collision avoidance requirements by adjusting orbit maintenance manoeuvres on several occasions and avoiding exclusive CAMs,' Isro explained.
About the return of satellites once they complete their mission, Isro said a total of 31 Indian satellites had re-entered the atmosphere till the end of 2024. In 2024 alone, nine Indian satellites did so. Among them was Cartosat-2, which re-entered the atmosphere on Feb 14, 2024, being Isro's first-ever LEO to be deorbited at end-of-life to reduce its post-mission orbital life from more than 30 years to less than four years.
A total of 136 Indian spacecraft, including those from private operators and academic institutions, were launched in Earth-orbit till Dec 31, 2024. The number of operational satellites owned by India stood at 22 in lower earth orbit (LEO) and 31 in geo-synchronous earth orbit (GEO) by 2024 end.
In addition, two Indian deep space missions, Chandrayaan-2 Orbiter and Aditya-L1 at Sun-Earth Lagrange's point, were active. Isro said 34 rocket bodies re-entered the Earth's atmosphere till 2024 end, and five of such re-entries took place in 2024.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Time of India
2 hours ago
- Time of India
India AI: 3 more startups to build indigenous foundation model; common compute capacity expanded
New Delhi: After Sarvam AI , India on Friday selected three more startups -- Soket AI , Gan AI, Gnani AI -- for building indigenous artificial intelligence foundation models. In line with its global AI ambitions backed by a comprehensive plan that entails enhanced AI infrastructure and local language model development, India has also announced availability of 16,000 more GPUs that would take the compute facility available to startups and researchers here to 34,000, with the support of industry partners. The expanded compute capacity on cloud will provide a common computational AI platform for training and inference, crucial to develop indigenous foundational models and AI solutions tailored to the Indian context. IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said significant progress has been made on India AI Mission, with focus on democratisation of technology. The compute facility supercharged with 34,000 GPUs will enable India to develop AI ecosystem in a big way, he said. Seven bidders have offered their commercials for various categories of AI compute units (GPUs). These include Cyfuture India, Ishan Infotech, Locuz Enterprise Solutions, Netmagic IT Services, Sify Digital Services, Vensysco Technologies, and Yotta Data Services. At the same time, three more teams -- Soket AI, Gan AI, Gnani AI -- have been selected for building indigenous artificial intelligence foundation models. "Like Sarvam, these three teams also have a very big target ahead of them. Whichever sector they focus on, they must be among the top five in the world," Vaishnaw said. Put simply, foundation models in generative AI are large, pre-trained models that form the base for a variety of AI applications. The Minister further said that 367 datasets have already been uploaded to AI Kosh. He also highlighted IndiaAI Mission's role in driving reverse brain drain, and creating a comprehensive ecosystem entailing foundational models, compute capacity, safety standards, and talent development initiatives. Vaishnaw emphasised that these efforts are aimed at building a complete and inclusive AI ecosystem in India. In April this year, Sarvam AI was selected to build India's first indigenous AI foundational model, marking a key milestone in the country's AI innovation ecosystem. Soket AI will develop open source 120 billion parametres foundation model optimised for the country's linguistic diversity targeting sectors such as defence, healthcare, and education. Gan AI will create 70 billion parameters of multilingual foundation model targeting capabilities to surpass the current global leader. Gnani AI will build a 14 billion parameter Voice AI foundation model delivering multilingal real-time speech processing with advances reasoning capabilities. Ganesh Gopalan, Co-Founder and CEO of said in a statement, "We are honoured to be selected under the IndiaAI Mission to develop large language models that truly represent India's linguistic diversity. At our mission has always been to make technology more inclusive and accessible". Gopalan further said is keen to "lead the way in developing voice-to-voice large language models for India and the world, because we believe transformative AI must speak the language of the people it serves". Meanwhile, under the IndiaAI Applications Development Initiative, Vaishnaw also announced the winners of the IndiaAI I4C CyberGuard AI Hackathon, jointly organised with Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C), Ministry of Home Affairs. "The Hackathon resulted in the development of AI-based solutions to enhance the classification of cybercrime complaints and support the identification of emerging crime patterns, trends, and modus operandi on the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal (NCRP). These models can interpret complex inputs such as handwritten FIRs, screenshots, and audio calls with improved speed and accuracy," an official release said. PTI
Time of India
4 hours ago
- Time of India
Earthquake of magnitude 3.5 strikes Tibet
Earthquake of magnitude 3.5 strikes Tibet (ANI) TIBET: An earthquake of magnitude 3.5 on the Richter Scale struck Tibet on Saturday, the National Center for Seismology said (NCS). As per the NCS, the earthquake struck at a shallow depth of 10km. In a post on X, the NCS said, "EQ of M: 3.5, On: 31/05/2025 03:11:19 IST, Lat: 29.03 N, Long: 87.06 E, Depth: 10 Km, Location: Tibet." Earlier on May 27, an earthquake of magnitude 3.6 struck the region at a depth of 10km, the NCS said. In a post on X, it said, "EQ of M: 3.6, On: 27/05/2025 22:16:07 IST, Lat: 34.74 N, Long: 80.58 E, Depth: 10 Km, Location: Tibet." Shallow earthquakes like these are more dangerous than deeper ones due to their greater energy release closer to the Earth's surface. This causes stronger ground shaking and increased damage to structures and casualties, compared to deeper earthquakes, which lose energy as they travel to the surface. The Tibetan Plateau is known for its seismic activity due to tectonic plate collisions. Tibet and Nepal lie on a major geological fault line where the Indian tectonic plate pushes up into the Eurasian plate, and earthquakes are a regular occurrence as a result. The region is seismically active, causing tectonic uplifts that can grow strong enough to change the heights of the Himalayas' peaks, Al Jazeera reported. "Education about earthquakes and earthquake-resilient buildings combined with funding for retrofits and resilient structures can help protect people and buildings when strong earthquakes occur," Marianne Karplus, a seismologist and geophysicist, told Al Jazeera. "The earth system is very complex, and we cannot predict earthquakes. However, we can conduct scientific studies to better understand what causes earthquakes in Tibet and to better understand the shaking and impacts resulting from earthquakes," Karplus, who is a professor of Geological Sciences at the University of Texas at El Paso, told Al Jazeera.
Hindustan Times
5 hours ago
- Hindustan Times
Earthquake of 3.5 magnitude strikes Tibet
An earthquake of magnitude 3.5 on the Richter Scale struck Tibet on Saturday, the National Center for Seismology said (NCS). As per the NCS, the earthquake struck at a shallow depth of 10km. In a post on X, the NCS said, 'EQ of M: 3.5, On: 31/05/2025 03:11:19 IST, Lat: 29.03 N, Long: 87.06 E, Depth: 10 Km, Location: Tibet.' Earlier on May 27, an earthquake of magnitude 3.6 struck the region at a depth of 10km, the NCS said. In a post on X, it said, 'EQ of M: 3.6, On: 27/05/2025 22:16:07 IST, Lat: 34.74 N, Long: 80.58 E, Depth: 10 Km, Location: Tibet.' Shallow earthquakes like these are more dangerous than deeper ones due to their greater energy release closer to the Earth's surface. This causes stronger ground shaking and increased damage to structures and casualties, compared to deeper earthquakes, which lose energy as they travel to the surface. The Tibetan Plateau is known for its seismic activity due to tectonic plate collisions. Tibet and Nepal lie on a major geological fault line where the Indian tectonic plate pushes up into the Eurasian plate, and earthquakes are a regular occurrence as a result. The region is seismically active, causing tectonic uplifts that can grow strong enough to change the heights of the Himalayas' peaks, Al Jazeera reported. "Education about earthquakes and earthquake-resilient buildings combined with funding for retrofits and resilient structures can help protect people and buildings when strong earthquakes occur," Marianne Karplus, a seismologist and geophysicist, told Al Jazeera. "The earth system is very complex, and we cannot predict earthquakes. However, we can conduct scientific studies to better understand what causes earthquakes in Tibet and to better understand the shaking and impacts resulting from earthquakes," Karplus, who is a professor of Geological Sciences at the University of Texas at El Paso, told Al Jazeera. (ANI)
