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The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) suffered a setback in its attempts to place the NVS-02 satellite in the desired orbit after the thrusters on board the spacecraft failed to fire, the space agency said on Sunday.
Launched on January 29 aboard the GSLV-Mk 2 rocket, the NVS-02 satellite was a key component of India's indigenous space-based navigation system. This launch also marked ISRO's 100th from the spaceport at Shriharikota in Andhra Pradesh.
"But the orbit raising operations towards positioning the satellite to the designated orbital slot could not be carried out as the valves for admitting the oxidizer to fire the thrusters for orbit raising did not open," the space agency said in an update to the GSLV-F15 mission on its website.
The satellite is orbiting the Earth in an elliptical Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit (GTO) which is not suitable for the navigation system.
"The satellite systems are healthy and the satellite is currently in elliptical orbit. Alternate mission strategies for utilising the satellite for navigation in an elliptical orbit are being worked out," ISRO said.
After the GSLV rocket placed the satellite in the GTO, the solar panels on board the satellite were successfully deployed and power generation was nominal.
Communication with the ground station has been established, the space agency said.
The launch on board the GSLV was successful as all the stages performed flawlessly and the orbit was achieved with a high degree of precision.
(With PTI inputs)
