Will re-establish contact with GSAT-6A: ISRO chief

Chairman K Sivan says it was an on-board power failure which led to the loss of communication link.

BENGALURU: Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) chairman K Sivan and top scientists of the country’s premier space agency are working round the clock at ISRO’s Hassan-based master control facility to re-establish contact with the GSAT-6A satellite since they lost the link at noon on Saturday.
With the satellite remaining incommunicado for over 32 hours (at the time this was written), the scientists are unable to raise the orbit of the 2,140 kg GSAT-6A to its planned operational space home at 36,000 km altitude over the Equator and 83 degrees east longitude.

ISRO Chairman K Sivan

Sivan confirmed to The New Indian Express that it was an onboard power failure which led to the loss of communication link. “There was a small power failure on the satellite. When that happens, it automatically goes into safe mode. We then lost the link,” he said over phone from Hassan.

He said although such snapping of communication links with satellites was a frequent phenomenon, “what is worrying now is the long duration that our link has gone missing. We lost it around noon on Saturday.”

The ISRO chairman said, “It does not happen merely with ISRO but with satellites launched world over. But that usually happens for small periods. More than thirty hours have elapsed since then.”

Despite expressing optimism that the problem will be solved and the link with the satellite re-established, Sivan, when asked about the consequences of the efforts not bearing fruit, said, “That means then we have lost the satellite… But we are working very hard at it and the link will be established.”

He also pointed out that although the first and the second orbit-raising operations were successfully carried out and the problem occurred when they were looking forward to its third orbit-raising manoeuvre on Sunday morning, the loss of link for such a long period also meant that some preliminary data has been lost.

“The entire mission operations team with controllers and other team members are doing everything possible to restore it. We are trying our very best to establish the link. We are confident of doing it,” said Sivan who replaced A S Kiran Kumar as ISRO chairman only on January 12.