In its 38th flight (PSLV-C36), ISRO's Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle successfully launched the 1,235kg Resourcesat-2A Satellite on 7th December from Satish Dhawan Space Centre SHAR, Sriharikota. It was the 37th consecutive successful mission of PSLV. 

Lift-off occurred at 10:25 am IST from the First Launch Pad. After a flight of 17 minutes 5 seconds, the vehicle achieved a polar Sun Synchronous Orbit of 824km inclined at an angle of 98.725 degree to the equator and 47 seconds later, Resourcesat-2A was separated from the PSLV fourth stage.

After separation, the two solar arrays of Resourcesat-2A deployed automatically and ISRO's Telemetry, Tracking and Command Network (ISTRAC) at Bangalore took over the control of the satellite. In the coming days, the satellite will be brought to its final operational configuration following which it will begin to provide imagery from its three cameras.  The data sent by Resourcesat-2A  will be used for agricultural applications like crop area and crop production estimation, drought monitoring, soil mapping, cropping system analysis and farm advisories generation. 

Like its predecessors Resourcesat-1 and 2, Resourcesat-2A has a unique 3-Tier imaging system with Advanced Wide Field Sensor (AWiFS), Linear Imaging Self Scanner-3 (LISS-3) and Linear Imaging Self Scanner-4 (LISS-4) cameras. The AWiFS provides images with a sampling of 56m, a swath of 740km and a revisit of 5 days whereas the LISS-3 provides 23.5m sampled images with 141km swath and a repitivity of 24 days. LISS-4 provides 5.8m sampled images with 70km swath and a revisit of 5 days.

The launch was the seventh in a record year for India’s space programme. India has successfully completed six PSLV flights this year, plus one launch of the more powerful Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV).