Iranian Satellite Launched by Russian Spacecraft into Orbit: Media

Iran successfully launched Pars-1, a homegrown satellite, into a 500-kilometer orbit on Thursday using a Soyuz rocket launch in eastern Russia, according to official media.

According to the official IRNA news agency, the 134-kg satellite was constructed by the Iranian Space Research Institute with the purpose of testing technologies for upcoming satellites and using it for remote sensing applications.

According to IRNA, the satellite, which has three cameras that can take pictures of Earth in the visible, short-wave infrared, and thermal infrared spectrums, can cover 95% of Iran’s land in less than a hundred days and the entire nation in less than forty-five days when using its night-vision feature.

Pars-1 was the 12th satellite launched by the current administration, which began in August 2021, according to Hassan Salarieh, the head of the Iranian Space Agency (ISA), during a press conference, according to IRNA.

He said that Iran would launch Pars-2, a second satellite with a resolution of eight meters per pixel, starting on March 20 of the following Iranian year, as reported by the semi-official Tasnim news agency.

Iranian Students’ News Agency (ISNA) said that late last month, Iran launched a domestic rocket from a launch pad in central Iran, delivering two nanosatellites and a communication and research satellite into an elliptic orbit with a minimum altitude of 450 km.