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Remembering IRS-1C Mission: The “Game Changer” of Indian Earth Observation Program

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Abstract

India’s second-generation earth observation satellite series started with the launch of IRS-1C in December 1995, twenty-five years ago. It is considered to be a “game changer” for Indian earth observation program. With a 5.8 m panchromatic (PAN) camera onboard, IRS-1C became the highest spatial resolution civilian operational satellite at the time of launch and maintained this status till the launch of IKONOS satellite in 1999. IRS-1C also had a unique feature of 3-tier imaging geometry that drew the attention of global remote sensing user community. Other than the PAN camera, the 23.5 m multispectral camera including a shortwave infrared band and the high repetitive coarse-resolution two-band camera facilitated many newer applications and scientific investigations. Commercially, it was one of the most successful missions of the IRS program. The lessons learnt from this mission were even more significant, as these have led to many dedicated theme-missions subsequently.

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Acknowledgements

We are indebted to Dr. George Joseph, Editor-in-chief, JISRS and Dr. R. R. Navalgund for their constant encouragement, guidance and also for their critical comments on the draft manuscript. We thankfully acknowledge Dr. V. Jayaraman for sharing many important references and useful suggestions while preparing this manuscript. Thanks are due to anonymous reviewers for their insightful comments and suggestions. The incorporation of their suggestions has improved the quality of the paper significantly.

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  1. Kongu Engineering College, Perundurai, 638060, India

    A. Senthil Kumar

  2. National Data Centre, National Remote Sensing Centre, Balanagar, Hyderabad, 500037, India

    N. Aparna

  3. National Institute of Advanced Studies, Indian Institute of Science Campus, Bengaluru, 560012, India

    Shailesh R. Nayak

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Senthil Kumar, A., Aparna, N. & Nayak, S.R. Remembering IRS-1C Mission: The “Game Changer” of Indian Earth Observation Program. J Indian Soc Remote Sens 49, 9–22 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12524-020-01183-8

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