TEMISAT and ITAMSAT
Meanwhile, in LEO two Italian microsatellites were launched in 1993 less than a month apart. The first, TEMISAT (Telespazio Micro Satellite), was built by Germany's Kayser Threde GmbH under contract to Italy's Telespazio and was launched as a piggy-back satellite with Russia's Meteor 2-21 on a Ukranian Tsyklon launch vehicle. The 32-kg TEMISAT was released into an orbit of 937 km by 969 km at an 82.5 degree inclination on 31 August 1993. The principal mission of TEMISAT is to collect environmental data from numerous, dispersed transmitters and forward the information to special data collection centers in the 138-150 MHz band. TEMISAT 1 was expected to operate 3-5 years but failed in the Fall of 1994 (References 153-157).
ITAMSAT (Italian Amateur Satellite), aka OSCAR 26, was launched as one of six piggyback microsatellites on the SPOT 3 mission on 26 September 1993. From its 500-km sun-synchronous orbit, ITAMSAT, like its amateur radio satellite predecessors, will connect radio enthusiasts around the world. The 10-kg, 23-cm cube satellite was designed and built by the Associazione Radiomatori Italiani near Milan for only $200,000. A second ITAMSAT is under development (References 158-160).
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