Final preparations are under way for the launch of Formosat-5, Taiwan’s first domestically developed and built satellite, from a US air base next week, an official said on Friday.
The satellite, which arrived at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California last month, is scheduled to be sent into space on Thursday.
The National Space Organization’s (NSPO) Formosat-5 project director Chang Ho-pen (張和本) said that testing in past weeks indicated that the satellite is functioning normally.
Screengrab from the SpaceX Web site
Although it took some time to integrate Formosat-5 with its launch vehicle, SpaceX’s Falcon 9, work has been successfully completed, Chang said.
Through Formosat-5, Taiwan will show the world that it is capable of independently building satellites, he said.
The satellite was designed by the NSPO and built by more than 50 domestic teams, including teams from CMOS Sensor Inc and National Central University.
The high-resolution optical remote-sensing satellite is the NSPO’s fourth satellite since its space program started in 1991, and the first to be fully produced domestically, from design and manufacture to assembly and testing.
It is to replace Formosat-2, which was retired in August last year.
Formosat-5 is to collect data for scientific research, passing over Taiwan once every two days, the NSPO said.
The satellite is to provide 2m panchromatic and 4m multispectral resolution images for a wide array of applications, including governmental, disaster forecasting and mitigation, national security and environmental observation tasks, as well as international technological exchanges, academic research and international humanitarian assistance, the NSPO said.
The satellite is to carry an Advanced Ionospheric Probe, which can develop weather models in space, monitor ionospheric disturbances and study seismic precursors associated with earthquakes, the organization said.
It took six years and NT$5.7 billion (US$188 million) to develop the 450kg satellite, which is 2.8m high, and 1.6m in diameter, the NSPO said.
A magnitude 6.1 earthquake struck off the coast of Yilan County at 8:39pm tonight, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, with no immediate reports of damage or injuries. The epicenter was 38.7km east-northeast of Yilan County Hall at a focal depth of 98.3km, the CWA’s Seismological Center said. The quake’s maximum intensity, which gauges the actual physical effect of a seismic event, was a level 4 on Taiwan’s 7-tier intensity scale, the center said. That intensity level was recorded in Yilan County’s Nanao Township (南澳), Hsinchu County’s Guansi Township (關西), Nantou County’s Hehuanshan (合歡山) and Hualien County’s Yanliao (鹽寮). An intensity of 3 was
Instead of focusing solely on the threat of a full-scale military invasion, the US and its allies must prepare for a potential Chinese “quarantine” of Taiwan enforced through customs inspections, Stanford University Hoover fellow Eyck Freymann said in a Foreign Affairs article published on Wednesday. China could use various “gray zone” tactics in “reconfiguring the regional and ultimately the global economic order without a war,” said Freymann, who is also a nonresident research fellow at the US Naval War College. China might seize control of Taiwan’s links to the outside world by requiring all flights and ships entering or leaving Taiwan
The first of 10 new high-capacity trains purchased from South Korea’s Hyundai Rotem arrived at the Port of Taipei yesterday to meet the demands of an expanding metro network, Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC) said yesterday. The train completed a three-day, 1,200km voyage from the Port of Masan in South Korea, the company said. Costing NT$590 million (US$18.79 million) each, the new six-carriage trains feature a redesigned interior based on "human-centric" transportation concepts, TRTC said. The design utilizes continuous longitudinal seating to widen the aisles and optimize passenger flow, while also upgrading passenger information displays and driving control systems for a more comfortable
Taiwan's first indigenous defense submarine, the SS-711 Hai Kun (海鯤, or Narwhal), departed for its 13th sea trial at 7am today, marking its seventh submerged test, with delivery to the navy scheduled for July. The outing also marked its first sea deployment since President William Lai (賴清德) boarded the submarine for an inspection on March 19, drawing a crowd of military enthusiasts who gathered to show support. The submarine this morning departed port accompanied by CSBC Corp’s Endeavor Manta (奮進魔鬼魚號) uncrewed surface vessel and a navy M109 assault boat. Amid public interest in key milestones such as torpedo-launching operations and overnight submerged trials,
RSS