Remembering IRS-1C Mission: The “Game Changer” of Indian Earth Observation Program

Abstract

India’s second-generation earth observation satellite series started with the launch of IRS-1C in December 1995, twenty-five years ago. It is considered to be a “game changer” for Indian earth observation program. With a 5.8 m panchromatic (PAN) camera onboard, IRS-1C became the highest spatial resolution civilian operational satellite at the time of launch and maintained this status till the launch of IKONOS satellite in 1999. IRS-1C also had a unique feature of 3-tier imaging geometry that drew the attention of global remote sensing user community. Other than the PAN camera, the 23.5 m multispectral camera including a shortwave infrared band and the high repetitive coarse-resolution two-band camera facilitated many newer applications and scientific investigations. Commercially, it was one of the most successful missions of the IRS program. The lessons learnt from this mission were even more significant, as these have led to many dedicated theme-missions subsequently.