The nation’s first domestically designed satellite, Formosat-5, is to be launched on Aug. 25 in the US to resume the observation missions of the decommissioned Formosat-2, the Cabinet said yesterday.
The satellite would collect data for natural disaster evaluation, national security, environmental monitoring, international rescue operations and scientific research, National Space Organization (NSPO) Director Chang Guey-shin (張桂祥) said.
Formosat-2 was decommissioned in August last year after being used in 343 disaster response missions such as providing authorities with immediate images of damaged areas during the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami in Japan in 2011, Chang said.
Photo courtesy of the Ministry of Science and Technology
The 450kg Formosat-5 is the first project in which the NSPO was fully responsible for all engineering, including payload, imaging sensors and ground control systems.
Formosat-5 is to carry the first locally made optical remote sensing instrument equipped with the world’s first space-grade metal oxide semiconductor image sensor, which the organization developed in cooperation with the nation’s electronics and semiconductor industries.
The satellite cost about NT$5.65 billion (US$186 million) to make and is to embark on a five-year observation mission around the globe.
The satellite’s launch was initially scheduled for October last year. A failed rocket test in September last year at SpaceX, the US company commissioned to launch Formosat-5, delayed the launches for all its customers, among which was the NSPO.
SpaceX is contractually required to pay 1.25 percent of the contract amount — about NT$700 million — for every month’s delay, Chang said, adding that the company is expected to pay 10 percent in compensation.
The Formosat-7 program, a follow-up Earth observation mission in which Taiwan is cooperating with the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, is to launch a constellation of 12 mission-specific satellites plus one NSPO-built satellite to perform radio occultation studies of the upper atmosphere, the NSPO said.
The first constellation of the Formosat-7 program, consisting of six satellites, is expected to be launched next year, the office said.
ECHOVIRUS 11: The rate of enterovirus infections in northern Taiwan increased last week, with a four-year-old girl developing acute flaccid paralysis, the CDC said Two imported cases of chikungunya fever were reported last week, raising the total this year to 13 cases — the most for the same period in 18 years, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said yesterday. The two cases were a Taiwanese and a foreign national who both arrived from Indonesia, CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Deputy Director Lee Chia-lin (李佳琳) said. The 13 cases reported this year are the most for the same period since chikungunya was added to the list of notifiable communicable diseases in October 2007, she said, adding that all the cases this year were imported, including 11 from
Prosecutors in New Taipei City yesterday indicted 31 individuals affiliated with the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) for allegedly forging thousands of signatures in recall campaigns targeting three Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmakers. The indictments stem from investigations launched earlier this year after DPP lawmakers Su Chiao-hui (蘇巧慧) and Lee Kuen-cheng (李坤城) filed criminal complaints accusing campaign organizers of submitting false signatures in recall petitions against them. According to the New Taipei District Prosecutors Office, a total of 2,566 forged recall proposal forms in the initial proposer petition were found during the probe. Among those
The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) today condemned the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) after the Czech officials confirmed that Chinese agents had surveilled Vice President Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) during her visit to Prague in March last year. Czech Military Intelligence director Petr Bartovsky yesterday said that Chinese operatives had attempted to create the conditions to carry out a demonstrative incident involving Hsiao, going as far as to plan a collision with her car. Hsiao was vice president-elect at the time. The MAC said that it has requested an explanation and demanded a public apology from Beijing. The CCP has repeatedly ignored the desires
The Ma-anshan Nuclear Power Plant’s license has expired and it cannot simply be restarted, the Executive Yuan said today, ahead of national debates on the nuclear power referendum. The No. 2 reactor at the Ma-anshan Nuclear Power Plant in Pingtung County was disconnected from the nation’s power grid and completely shut down on May 17, the day its license expired. The government would prioritize people’s safety and conduct necessary evaluations and checks if there is a need to extend the service life of the reactor, Executive Yuan spokeswoman Michelle Lee (李慧芝) told a news conference. Lee said that the referendum would read: “Do
RSS