In his message to K. Radhakrishnan, Chairman of ISRO, the President said, “Please accept my heartiest congratulations to your team and you at the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) for the successful launch of India’s Communication Satellite GSAT-16. The nation is proud of this achievement, which is a significant milestone in the progress of our space capabilities."
"Kindly convey my greetings to the members of your team of scientists, engineers, technologists and all others associated with this great mission. Our nation is grateful for their hard work and proud of their accomplishments," he said.
In a significant development, India's latest communication satellite GSAT-16 was successfully placed in orbit by Ariane-5 rocket in the early hours on Sunday from the space port of Kourou in French Guiana.
"India's communication satellite, GSAT-16, was successfully launched at 0210 hrs IST today (December 7, 2014) by the Ariane-5 launch vehicle VA221 of Arianespace from Kourou, French Guiana. Ariane-5 precisely placed GSAT-16 into the intended Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit (GTO), after a flight of 32 minutes and 20.4 Seconds duration," Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) said in a statement.
ISRO's Master Control Facility (MCF) at Hassan in Karnataka started acquiring the signal from the satellite at 0241 hrs IST and the commanding of the satellite was initiated.
Initial checks have indicated normal health of the satellite.
The present orbit of the satellite will be raised to Geostationary Orbit of about 36,000 km altitude through three orbit raising manoeuvres by the firing of GSAT-16's Liquid Apogee Motor (LAM) Engine.
Preparations are underway for the first firing, planned in the early hours of Monday.
The satellite will be placed in the Geostationary Orbit by Dec 12, 2014 and subsequently the satellite's communication transponders will be switched on for in-orbit testing.
Meanwhile, the ISRO had announced that after the successful launch, GSAT-16 is in good health. ISRO's Master Control Facility at Hassan has taken over the control of the satellite.
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