BENGALURU: The Indian Space Research Organization (Isro) has mooted a proposal for a ground station in Vietnam. The Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) is also keen on the project.
The organization already has a network of ground stations within the country, one in Mauritius and two in Indonesia.
The proposal is going to help India receive, process and use data from Indian satellites for a variety of applications including disaster management support, a senior scientist told TOI.
It can also be used to provide training in space science, technology and applications which will benefit other members of Association of South-East Asian Nations (Asean) too —Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos PDR, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.
Isro seems to have already convinced Prime Minister Narendra Modi who discussed the topic at the India-Asean meet at Nay Pyi Taw, Myanmar in November.
“Modi has broken the ice on the matter and it assumes importance as this is a diplomatic project which will need another country’s co-operation,” the scientist said.
Another scientist said that currently, for any major launch that has a launch phase of more than 22 minutes (like Mars mission), they need to use the help of global ground stations for which there are partnerships.
“But for launches that have a launch phase of 22 minutes or less (all our communication and remote sensing satellites), we use our own stations barring one.
Besides, this will allow India to take lead in the region and act as a station for other smaller Asian countries during their launches.
Source from India Defence News.
