Iran First RECSAT Planned

© C. P. Vick 2010 All Rights Reserved

May 21, 2010

Early in 2010 Iran’s Minister of Communications, Reza Taghipour indicated that Iran is now planning to launch three new satellites of five or six domestically built satellites then under construction to be launched over the next two years. The first launch is expected before March 2011 and may come at the end of 2010 though this remains in doubt.

Iran had previously announced that it was in the process of preparing a total of five to seven satellites some of which were to be foreign launched. Two were to be launched in 2010 with Russian help via a newly signed contract in May 2010 between Iran and Russia.

Those new satellites were the rectangular Ya Mahdi Mehr Navid [good news or promising sign]telecommunications satellite the Tolou [sunrise or dawn] six sides duel purpose remote survey imaging RECSAT/SIGINT, Satellite, and four sided Mesbah-2 [Lantern] telecommunications satellite.

Tolou [Sunrise or Dawn] 100 kilograms, [220 pound] satellite is solar powered and will be placed into a 500 kilometer [310 mile] high orbit and is designed to operate for three years with the Chinese derived design technology utilized with the CCD camera data-imaging transmission system. It will be launched on a Simorgh-3 booster on a long pole for a gravity gradient payload reconnaissance satellite designed by Sa Iran known as the Iran Electronics Industries part of the defense ministry.

Iran’s Minister of Defense, Brigadier General Ahmad Vahidi described the Tolou as Iran’s first identified reconnaissance Satellite, SIGINT Satellite. In describing its capabilities emphasis was placed on the ability of the satellite to identify an adversary’s software, hardware and their movements.