''Monitor-E'' was the first Russian satellite of a fleet of newly designed, small Earth observing satellites. It was launched 26 August 2005 at 18:34 UTC from Plesetsk Cosmodrome, and placed in a

Sun-synchronous orbit A Sun-synchronous orbit (SSO), also called a heliosynchronous orbit, is a nearly polar orbit around a planet, in which the satellite passes over any given point of the planet's surface at the same local mean solar time. More technically, it is ...

of . The satellite was decommissioned 21 January 2008 and decayed from orbit 22 September 2020.

Design

''Monitor-E'' had a set of remote sensing devices. They were intended to make maps of the Earth's surface to be used for ecological monitoring and charting geological features. It was built by the

Khrunichev State Research and Production Space Center The Khrunichev State Research and Production Space Center (''Государственный космический научно-производственный центр (ГКНПЦ) имени М. В. Хру́ничева'' in Russian) is a ...

. A mock-up of Monitor-E (COSPAR 2003-031A) was launched 30 June 2003 aboard Rokot rocket.

Specifications

Sensors * 8 m

panchromatic Panchromatic emulsion is a type of black-and-white photographic emulsion that is sensitive to all wavelengths of visible light. Description A panchromatic emulsion renders a realistic reproduction of a scene as it appears to the human eye, altho ...

(0.51-0.85 μm), swath width of not less 90 km * 20–40 m multispectral (0.54-0.59/0.63-0.68/0.79-0.90 μm), swath width of not less than 160 km Onboard storage *2 × 200 gigabit capacity Data communications *Transmission speeds of 15.36/61.44/122.88 Mbit/s Orbit *Altitude: - 97.6 degree Sun-synchronous inclination Spacecraft *Planned active life: 5 years *Orientation precision: 0.1 degrees *Stabilization precision: 0.001 degrees/s *Average daily power consumption: 450 W *Mass:

Communications problems

After launch, communications with ''Monitor-E'' was initially difficult to establish, but a few hours later it was successfully contacted and control was established. On 19 October 2005 new problems developed and no communication was possible since then. Later on communications were restored and photographs from both cameras were published on 30 November 2005.

References

External links

Monitor-E site
by NTs OMZ Earth observation satellites of Russia Derelict satellites orbiting Earth Satellites using the Yakhta bus Spacecraft launched by Rokot rockets Spacecraft launched in 2005 Roscosmos {{Russia-spacecraft-stub