For SpaceX, launching a rocket is like traveling 50km by road, you sure know you’ll get to destination. They’ve done it again, launching a rocket carrying satellites into low earth orbit.
It is called the PAZ mission. It carried a satellite for a Spanish company called Hisdesat. It also carried the first demonstration satellites for SpaceX’s own satellite internet constellation.
The launch of Paz had previously been scheduled to take place last Sunday. However, SpaceX announced a delay on Saturday to the next available date: Wednesday. That attempt was scrubbed due to Upper Level Winds being just above the acceptable limits.
What is PAZ
The word PAZ means “peace” in Spanish. Paz is a radar imaging satellite which will be operated by Spanish company Hisdesat. The spacecraft will provide day and night, all-weather imaging capabilities for Hisdesat’s customer, Spain’s Ministry of Defence.
“Hisdesat’s PAZ satellite is equipped with an advanced radar instrument designed for high flexibility, and with the capability to operate in numerous modes allowing for the choice of several different image configurations. It will be able to generate images with up to 25 cm resolution, day and night and regardless of the meteorological conditions.
Designed for a mission life of five and a half years, PAZ will orbit Earth 15 times per day, covering an area of over 300,000 square kilometers from an altitude of 514 kilometers and a velocity of seven kilometers per second. On its slightly inclined quasi-polar orbit, PAZ will cover the entire globe in 24 hours, serving both government and commercial needs.
PAZ also features a sophisticated Automatic Identification System (AIS), simultaneously combining for the first time ship AIS signals and Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) imagery, increasing the monitoring capacities of the maritime domain worldwide.” SpaceX said.
SpaceX would be getting more jobs like this since they cut the cost of satellite launched by two-third. SpaceX did not land the first stage because it was reused already, however they planned landing the fairing( where the payload is housed).
