Kenya launched its first operational Earth observation satellite on Saturday aboard a SpaceX rocket from the United States, a live broadcast from Elon Musk’s rocket company showed.
The satellite, developed by nine Kenyan engineers, will collect agricultural and environmental data, including floods, droughts and forest fires, which authorities plan to use for disaster management and to fight food shortages.
The Falcon 9 rocket carrying the Taifa-1 satellite lifted off at about 06:48 GMT without incident from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, after three delays due to bad weather.
Satellite into space under SpaceX ride-sharing program
“Taifa-1 separation confirmed,” SpaceX said in a broadcast as the satellite was launched about an hour and four minutes after the rocket’s liftoff.
“We have problems brought on by climate change that the satellite, with its imaging capability, (will be able to help monitor),” Captain Alloyce Were, an aerospace engineer and deputy director of Navigation and Positioning at the government-run Kenya Space Agency, told on Friday before the satellite’s launch.
“We can track forest changes, we can track urbanization changes.”
The satellite was assembled with the help of Bulgarian aerospace company Endurosat at a cost of 50 million Kenyan shillings ($372,000) over two years, the space agency said.
The agency says it will operate for five years and then decay, enter the atmosphere and burn up within 20 years.
The launch vehicle had 50 payloads from other countries, including Turkey, as part of SpaceX’s rideshare program.
Written by: Vaishali verma