BILSAT-1 (formerly just ''BILSAT'') was an

earth observation satellite An Earth observation satellite or Earth remote sensing satellite is a satellite used or designed for Earth observation (EO) from orbit, including spy satellites and similar ones intended for non-military uses such as environmental monitorin ...

designed and developed by

TÜBİTAK Space Technologies Research Institute TÜBİTAK Space Technologies Research Institute ( tr, TÜBİTAK Uzay Teknolojileri Araştırma Enstitüsü) or TÜBİTAK UZAY for short, is a Turkish institution carrying out research and development projects on space technology, electronics, in ...

(TÜBİTAK UZAY) and produced in

Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a list of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolia, Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with ...

as part of the

Disaster Monitoring Constellation The Disaster Monitoring Constellation for International Imaging (DMCii) or just Disaster Monitoring Constellation (DMC) consists of a number of remote sensing satellites constructed by Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd (SSTL) and operated for the ...

(DMC) project in the context of a show-how program led by

DMC International Imaging DMC International Imaging (DMCii) is the company that manages the Disaster Monitoring Constellation for the International Charter for Space and Major Disasters. It also sells satellite imaging services under contract and manages the operations of s ...

Surrey Satellite Technology Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd, or SSTL, is a company involved in the manufacture and operation of small satellites. A spin-off company of the University of Surrey, it is presently wholly owned by Airbus Defence and Space. The company began ...

(SSTL).

Launch

BILSAT-1 was launched from Plesetsk Cosmodrome Site 132/1, Arkhangelsk Oblast in

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-eigh ...

by a

Kosmos-3M The Kosmos-3M (russian: Космос-3М meaning "''Cosmos''", GRAU index 11K65M) was a Russian space launch vehicle, member of the Kosmos rocket family. It was a liquid-fueled two-stage launch vehicle, first launched in 1967 and with over 420 ...

space launch vehicle on September 27, 2003 at 06:12 UTC in a multiple-satellite payload launch along with six other satellites, namely Mozhayets-4 and Larets of Russia, NigeriaSat of

Nigeria Nigeria ( ), , ig, Naìjíríyà, yo, Nàìjíríà, pcm, Naijá , ff, Naajeeriya, kcg, Naijeriya officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a country in West Africa. It is situated between the Sahel to the north and the Gulf of G ...

, UK-DMC from the United Kingdom,

South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and sharing a Korean Demilitarized Zone, land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed ...

n STSAT-1 and

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG),, is a country in Central Europe. It is the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany lies between the Baltic and North Sea to the north and the Alps to the sou ...

's Rubin 4-DS. It was placed in a polar, circular, sun-synchronous

geocentric orbit A geocentric orbit or Earth orbit involves any object orbiting Earth, such as the Moon or artificial satellites. In 1997, NASA estimated there were approximately 2,465 artificial satellite payloads orbiting Earth and 6,216 pieces of space debr ...

at an altitude of with orbital parameters as period 98.5 min, apogee , perigee and

inclination Orbital inclination measures the tilt of an object's orbit around a celestial body. It is expressed as the angle between a Plane of reference, reference plane and the orbital plane or Axis of rotation, axis of direction of the orbiting object ...

98.2°.

Mission

One of the four spacecraft of the DMC project, which is an organization for international space program cooperation formed by seven countries, namely United Kingdom,

Algeria ) , image_map = Algeria (centered orthographic projection).svg , map_caption = , image_map2 = , capital = Algiers , coordinates = , largest_city = capital , religi ...

, China, Nigeria,

Thailand Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is b ...

Vietnam Vietnam or Viet Nam ( vi, Việt Nam, ), officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam,., group="n" is a country in Southeast Asia, at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of and population of 96 million, making it ...

and Turkey, BILSAT-1 was dedicated to studies on agriculture, forestry, hydrology, land cover/use and mapping, environment as well as urban area development. It was built at a cost of $14 million. The first images were from

Cape Town Cape Town ( af, Kaapstad; , xh, iKapa) is one of South Africa's three capital cities, serving as the seat of the Parliament of South Africa. It is the legislative capital of the country, the oldest city in the country, and the second larges ...

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring count ...

taken on October 18, Gulf of İskenderun, Turkey taken on October 30 and Kuwait City taken on November 6, 2003. BILSAT-1 ended its mission in August 2006 due to battery cells failure.

Payloads

Turkey's first indigenously developed scientific

microsatellite A microsatellite is a tract of repetitive DNA in which certain DNA motifs (ranging in length from one to six or more base pairs) are repeated, typically 5–50 times. Microsatellites occur at thousands of locations within an organism's genome. ...

for

remote sensing Remote sensing is the acquisition of information about an object or phenomenon without making physical contact with the object, in contrast to in situ or on-site observation. The term is applied especially to acquiring information about Ear ...

, BILSAT-1 was based on an enhanced SSTL-100

satellite bus A satellite bus (or spacecraft bus) is the main body and structural component of a satellite or spacecraft, in which the payload and all scientific instruments are held. Bus-derived satellites are opposed to specially produced satellites. Bus- ...

. The satellite features a multi-spectral instrument called ÇOBAN, which is a low-resolution 8-channel camera. The name is an abbreviation for "ÇOk-BANtlı Kamera" for "Multi-Band Camera". It has two imaging sensors, a 4-band

visible and near-infrared The visible and near-infrared (VNIR) portion of the electromagnetic spectrum has wavelengths between approximately 400 and 1100 nanometers (nm). It combines the full visible spectrum with an adjacent portion of the infrared spectrum up to the ...

(VNIR) sensor at a resolution of and a high-resolution panchromatic sensor at . The

swath width A swathe (; rhymes with "bathe") or swath (; rhymes with "cloth") is the width of a scythe stroke or a mowing-machine blade, the path of this width made in mowing or the mown grass or grain lying on such a path. The mower with a scythe moves alon ...

s were for the VNIR and for the panchromatic sensor. The sensors had a 4-day repeat cycle. BILSAT-1 hosted a real time image compression module named GEZGIN, an abbreviation for "GErçek Zamanda Görüntü İşleyeN", which is a digital signal processor using

JPEG 2000 JPEG 2000 (JP2) is an image compression standard and coding system. It was developed from 1997 to 2000 by a Joint Photographic Experts Group committee chaired by Touradj Ebrahimi (later the JPEG president), with the intention of superseding th ...

algorithm to compress images taken by the satellite. Further payloads are on board propulsion,

GPS navigation device A satellite navigation device (satnav device) is a user equipment that uses one or more of several global navigation satellite systems (GNSS) to calculate the device's geographical position and provide navigational advice. Depending on the ...

, a GPS attitude receiver and a

control moment gyroscope A control moment gyroscope (CMG) is an attitude control device generally used in spacecraft attitude control systems. A CMG consists of a spinning rotor and one or more motorized gimbals that tilt the rotor’s angular momentum. As the rotor tilt ...

. BILSAT-1 also hosted new technologies such as high-capacity solid-state data recorders and

star tracker A star tracker is an optical device that measures the positions of stars using photocells or a camera. As the positions of many stars have been measured by astronomers to a high degree of accuracy, a star tracker on a satellite or spacecraft may ...

References

{{Turkey space program Earth observation satellites of Turkey Spacecraft launched in 2003 Derelict satellites orbiting Earth Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey