BENGALURU: After travelling for more than 126 days, the Aditya-L1 satellite, India’s first observatory to study the Sun, will be finally placed in its designated orbit around 6pm Saturday. Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) scientists will be performing the crucial manoeuvre of placing the satellite in the halo orbit at Lagrange Point 1 (L1) for the first time.
The spacecraft was launched on September 2, 2023, from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC) in Sriharikota. The mission has been in the works for about three years, and in discussion since 2008. Aditya-L1 has been developed indigenously by ISRO and is expected to have a life of five years, however, scientists added that it can go beyond that.
The satellite will be placed in a halo orbit of the Sun-Earth system, which is about 1.5 million km from the Earth, and Aditya-L1 would have covered only one per cent of the distance to the Sun. Scientists said that Aditya-L1 is healthy and performing well. Placing the satellite in a halo orbit around the L1 point will have the major advantage of continuously viewing the Sun without any occultation or eclipses.
This mission will observe the solar atmosphere, mainly the chromosphere and corona, the outermost layers of the Sun, and use several payloads to record the local environment at L1.
There are a total of seven payloads on-board, with four of them carrying out remote sensing of the Sun and three carrying out observational experiments. Scientists said the study of the Sun will warn about solar storms and protect Indian satellites and communication networks from being disrupted due to solar flares and solar storms.
As per media reports, India has Rs 50,000 crore in space assets, including 50 operational satellites.