SOURCE: AFI
NASA has successfully completed the necessary repairs and modifications to the radar antenna reflector for the NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar (NISAR) mission. The reflector, which was flown back to the United States in March due to insufficient thermal protection coating, is now ready to be shipped to the Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SHAR) in India.
Due to the ongoing eclipse season, which will continue through February, the launch of NISAR has been rescheduled to March 2025. The alternating periods of sunlight and shadow during solar eclipses can negatively impact the deployment of the radar reflector and boom, necessitating a delay in the launch.
On October 15, NASA’s C-130 Hercules team departed from Wallops Island to retrieve the repaired radar antenna reflector from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). The reflector will then be transported to Bengaluru, India, where it will be integrated with the rest of the NISAR spacecraft.
The NISAR mission, a joint collaboration between NASA and the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), aims to provide unprecedented insights into Earth’s changing landscapes. The radar reflector is a critical component of the mission, enabling the spacecraft to measure changes in Earth’s surface over time.