Last Sunday, the National Institute for Space Research (Inpe) launched the Amazonia 1 satellite, the first Earth observation satellite designed and operated by Brazil. The launch took place at 01h54 (Brasília time) this Sunday (28/2), from the Satish Dhawan Space Center (SHAR), in Sriharikota, India. Inpe is the executor of the project, coordinated by the Ministry of Science, Technology, and Innovation (MCTI) in partnership with the Brazilian Space Agency (AEB).

Inpe's headquarters, in São José dos Campos (SP), is connected to the Brazilian academic network, the Ipê network, through a 10 Gb/s circuit. Through this connection and its international connections, Inpe communicates with earth stations and can transmit telemetry commands to control the satellite.

In the week prior to the launch, RNP provided a second redundant circuit of the NipBr provider to ensure total network availability at the time of the launch. They also carried out testing with the Vivo telecommunications provider to prevent failures and put together an emergency service operation that involved a team to identify and respond to potential security incidents.

About the satellite

According to INPE, the Amazonia 1 will be an important instrument of remote sensing to observe and monitor deforestation, particularly in the Amazon region. It will provide images for environmental and agriculture monitoring throughout the Brazilian territory with a high rate of revisits. It will also monitor coastal regions, water reservoirs, environmental disasters, among other applications. 

The data will be available to both the scientific community and governmental bodies, as well as to users interested in having a better understanding of the terrestrial environment. Still, according to the research institute, the satellite is the first to be built from the Multimission Platform (MMP), a structure developed by INPE and able to adapt to the purposes of different missions and, thus, reduce space project costs.

For more information, access the Inpe website.

Source: Inpe, with information about RNP.