Last Updated on July 30, 2026 by Vinod Saini
PSLV-C40, 710 kg Cartosat-2 Series Remote Sensing Satellite-Cartosat-2F along with 30 co-passenger satellites was successfully launched by ISRO’s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle in its forty second flight on January 12, 2018 from Satish Dhawan Space Centre SHAR, Sriharikota. This Cartosat-2F satellite was delivered successfully into orbit 503 kilometers above Earth and deployed automatically and ISRO’s Telemetry, Tracking and Command Network (ISTRAC) at Bengaluru took over the control of the satellite. The satellite will be brought to its final operational configuration in the coming days and will begin to provide remote sensing data using its panchromatic (black and white) and multispectral (colour) cameras.
Cartosat-2F Satellite, PSLV-C40, launched on the new mission is an Earth-mapping satellite designed to assist land and resource monitoring and management. It is part of a growing series of Cartosat-2 satellites and is the seventh in a constellation of similar remote sensing satellites that ISRO has built up in space. All of them have sensitive advanced cameras on board to take continuous images of the earth that are used for a variety of land information applications such as urban and rural planning, mapping, laying pipelines, and monitoring geographical assets.
Two Indian co-passenger satellites of Cartosat-2, the 11 kg INS-1C Nano-satellite and the 100 kg class Microsatellite are also being monitored and controlled from ISTRAC, Bengaluru. The 28 international customer satellites, including the asteroid-hunting Arkyd-6 Nano satellite for the U.S. space mining company Planetary Resources, belong to Canada, Finland, France, Republic of Korea, UK and the USA.
So far, PSLV has successfully launched 51 Indian satellites and 237 customer satellites from 28 different countries in space including a World record feat in February 2017 when 104 satellites were placed in orbit at one go in a single launch and the other major milestones achieved by ISRO in the recent years are as under:
- Cartosat satellite was launched successfully by PSLV C-38 in June 2017
- GSLV Mk-III was launched successfully carrying GSAT 19 communication satellite in June 2017
- South Asia satellite was launched, which was a gift to neighbouring countries in May 2017
- First experimental mission of Scramjet engine towards realisation of Air Breathing system was successfully tested in August 2016
- Seven Satellite Constellation for Navigation system NavIC was established In April 2016.
- Indian Space Programme has placed Astrosat, a multi-wavelength observatory in August 2015. It observes universe in optical, ultraviolet, low and high energy X-ray region of the electromagnetic spectrum, whereas most other scientific satellites are capable of observing a narrow range of wavelength band.
- Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) is designed to orbit Mars. It is functioning well since its positioning in Mars orbit in September 24, 2014. The designed mission life of MOM was six months but has successfully completed more than three years and is expected to function further. All scientific payloads continue to perform well.
