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In a primary for South Africa’s area business, three regionally produced nanosatellites are set to launch into area on Thursday.
The first Maritime Domain Awareness Satellite constellation (MDASat-1) can be launched as a part of US aerospace firm SpaceX’s Transporter-3 mission.
The launch is scheduled to happen from Cape Canaveral within the United States on January 13, 2022, at 5.25 pm South African time. This is the newest estimated time and is topic to change relying on climate situations.
South Africa’s satellites can be launched aboard US aerospace firm SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket as a “rideshare payload” of the corporate’s Transporter-3 (or ISI Launch 36P) mission and can be deployed in low Earth orbit at an altitude of 525 kilometres. Transporter-3, SpaceX’s third devoted rideshare mission, can be carrying a complete of 105 spacecraft, together with CubeSats, microsats, PocketQubes and orbital switch automobiles.
The MDASat-1 launch is a big milestone for South Africa, marking the primary launch of a satellite tv for pc constellation developed completely on the African continent.
Welcoming the initiative, the Minister of Higher Education, Science and Innovation, Blade Nzimande, mentioned the Department of Science and Innovation’s (DSI) funding and assist of South Africa’s satellite tv for pc building business is reaping the rewards.
“This will further cement South Africa’s position as an African leader in small satellite development and help the country to capture a valuable share of a niche market in the fast-growing global satellite value chain,” mentioned Nzimande.
The launch of the primary three satellites of the MDASat constellation follows three years after the launch of probably the most superior South African nanosatellite to date, ZACube 2, as a know-how demonstrator for the MDASat constellation.
“Since its launch in 2018, ZACube-2 has been providing cutting-edge very high frequency (VHF) data exchange communication systems to the country’s maritime industry, as a contribution to Operation Phakisa,” mentioned Nzimande mentioned, including that the DSI invested R27 million over three years within the improvement of the MDASat constellation. The DSI is implementing this work by the Cape Peninsula University of Technology (CPUT).
Although South Africa has been concerned, on a comparatively small scale, in area actions because the daybreak of the area age in 1957, the nationwide area business requires specialised expertise.
Nzimande mentioned the dearth of area professionals and engineers has prompted the DSI and its entity, the National Research Foundation (NRF), to provoke a human capital improvement programme at CPUT below the French South African Institute of Technology (F’SATI) dice satellite tv for pc (CubeSat) programme, with the introduction of a Master’s in Electrical Engineering specializing in satellite tv for pc programs.
“As part of this programme, students are taught engineering principles using CubeSats as training tools,” mentioned Nzimande.
“CubeSats are built using the same engineering principles as any other satellite, hence highly specialised and advanced skills are acquired through this programme.”
The full MDASat constellation can be an operational constellation of 9 dice satellites that may detect, establish and monitor vessels in close to real-time in assist of South African maritime area consciousness.