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TripleSat Satellite

The TripleSat satellite constellation offers mid-range, 80-cm resolution imagery at an affordable price.

The TripleSat Advantage

Wide Imagery Footprint

TripleSat images are at least 23.4-km across, making them one of the widest of any high resolution satellite. That equates to fewer scenes for complete coverage of large areas, making it easier to work with this imagery.

Daily Collections of Anywhere

The four satellite TripleSat constellation can be tasked to collect imagery of any location on the planet every single day.

A Focus on Tasking

21AT puts all of their focus on new collections of imagery so tasking on the TripleSat constellation means the industry’s shortest timelines even in historical competitive regions like China, Nigeria and the Philippines.

Overview & History

The TripleSat Constellation reached orbit on July 10, 2015 after its launch from Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota, India by Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd. (SSTL). As the name suggests, TripleSat is a three satellite high-resolution constellation (well, actually, it is a four satellites after another 2018 launch!) which collects 1-meter (m) panchromatic and 4-m 4-band multispectral imagery. SSTL and Beijing, China based Twenty Frist Century Aerospace Technology Company Ltd. (21AT) jointly operate and manage the capacity of TripleSat-1/2/3/4.

Phased in orbit equally apart from each other, the TripleSat constellation offers daily revisits to any location on the planet. The four satellites also image one of the widest swaths of any high resolution system at 23.4 kilometers (km). Daily revisits and large footprints combine to make TripleSat an industry-leading high-resolution monitoring and tasking constellation.

TripleSat Specifications

Launch Details
  • Launch Date: July 10, 2015, 16:28 UTC; September 16, 2018, 16:38 UTC, fourth identical satellite launched
  • Vehicle: PSLV-XL (Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle); PSLV-C42, fourth satellite
  • Site: Satish Dhawan Space Centre, Sriharikota, India
  • Expected Mission Life: at least 7 years for each identical satellite
TripleSat Components
  • Satellite Model: DMC-3 (SSTL-300S1), a four satellite constellation (i.e. TripleSat-1/2/3/4) built by Surrey Satellite Technology (SSTL)
  • Dimensions: ~3-m (meters) tall x 0.87-m diameter with body-mounted solar array; 458 kg
  • Solar Array: 2.27 sq m of Gallium-Arsenide solar panels, 15Ahr battery
  • Control Systems:
    • 3-axis stabilized
    • Actuators–four SSTL-100SP-O reaction wheels, four 200SP-M momentum wheels
    • Altitude determination–Rigel-L star trackers, sun sensors and SGR-10 GPS
  • Onboard Storage Capacity: 544 gigabytes (GB)
  • Ground Communication Systems:
    • Imagery & metadata downlink–500 Mbits per second, X-band
    • Commands & telemetry–S-Band
  • Focal Plane:
    • Panchromatic Charge Coupled Device (CCD) module–4 stack linear array, 6,408 pixels/stack
    • Multispectral CCD module–4 stack linear array, 1,602 pixels/stack
  • Optical Sensor Assembly: 6.667-m focal length, 420-milimeter (mm) diameter aperture
Orbit Characteristics
  • Altitude: 651 kilometers (km); four satellites in same orbital plane
  • Period: 97.7 minutes
  • Inclination: 98.1°
  • Direction: sun-synchronous circular, south to north (across the lit side of Earth)
  • Equatorial Crossing Time: 10:30 AM local time (approximate; across lit side of Earth)
  • Revisit Frequency:
    • 35° off-nadir or higher–daily
    • 25° off-nadir–2 days, +/- 0 to 40° latitude; daily, greater +/- 50° latitude
    • 15° off-nadir–3 days, +/- 0 to 30° latitude; 2 days, +/- 40 to 60° latitude; daily, greater +/- 70° latitude
Imaging System
  • Spectral Bands:
    • Panchromatic
    • 4-band multispectral (blue, green, red and near-infrared red [NIR])
  • Sensor Resolution:
    • At nadir–1-m panchromatic & 4-m multispectral
    • 5° off-nadir–0.99-m panchromatic & 3.96-m multispectral
    • 25° off-nadir–1.2-m panchromatic & 4.8-m multispectral
    • 35° off-nadir–1.58-m panchromatic & 6.32-m multispectral
    • Imagery delivered at either 0.80-m panchromatic & 3.2-m multispectral; or 1-m panchromatic & 4-m multispectral
  • Spectral Band Wavelength Range: (in nm)
    • Panchromatic–450 to 650
    • Blue–440 to 510
    • Green–510 to 590
    • Red–600 to 670
    • NIR–760 to 910
  • Dynamic Range: 10-bits
Collection Capabilities
  • Footprint Width: 23.8 km (at nadir)
  • Collection Geometry: (at 45° off-nadir)
    • Mono, large area –23.8 km x 23.8 km (1 strips wide, 1×1 scene)
    • Mono, long strip–4,000 km x 23.8 km (1 strip only)
    • Stereo, large area–42 km x 47.2 km (2 pairs wide, 2×2 scenes)
  • Retargeting Ability: 40 sec (time to slew 30 degrees, fast response mode)
  • Daily Collection Capacity: 634,441 sq km, likely increased with 4th satellite but unclear if capacity is available for markets outside China
  • Georeferenced Horizontal Accuracy: < 50-m 1-sigma (nadir pointing, without ground control points, no star tracker blinding)

Pricing

Data Source

archive

Minimum Order Size

25 sq km (per area & date)

Product Type

georeferenced + natural color or 4-band

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