By Marcela Valente
BUENOS AIRES, Aug 29 1996 (IPS)

The first satellite completely designed and manufactured in Argentina, on the basis of technology initially developed as part of a missile project, flew over the country on Thursday, shortly after being launched from a Russian platform.

Speaking with IPS, the director of the Air Force’s Universitary Aeronautics Institute, Brigadier-General Raul Camussi, said the micro-satellite (uSAT-1) only carries a photographic camera, but that the project which is in its early stages should lead to major technological developments.

In the future, the satellite could carry video cameras and remote sensors to instantaneously transmit information on crops, the state of the topsoil, floods or forest fires, for example. Camussi also stressed the project’s impact on the training of future Argentine experts.

The satellite cost 1.1 million dollars, plus 200,000 for the transfer to Russia. It was built by a group of 20 Argentine civil engineers who belong to the aeronautics institute, which is located in the province of Cordoba, some 800 kilometres northwest of Buenos Aires.

The majority of those who participated in the project previously belonged to the team that had developed the technology to build the “Condor II” missile, suspended by President Carlos Menem in 1992 at the request of the United States and Israel, which feared the technology would reach Iraq, Iran or Syria.

The project of the Condor II – which had a reach of 1,200 kilometres – got underway during Argentina’s last military dictatorship (1976-83) at a Cordoba air force base, and continued under the government of former president Raul Alfonsin (1983-89), Menem’s predecessor.

Camussi said that not only did many of the experts on the Condor II team take part in developing the uSAT-1, but that the two projects share “common elements.” However, he refused to call the satellite an off-shoot of the previous project.

Meanwhile, the director of the Institute’s Centre for Applied Research, Ladislao Mathe, said the uSAT-1 project was presented in mid-1992, “when the development of the Condor II, a rocket that could carry satellites or missiles, was suspended.”

The governor of the province of Cordoba, Ramon Mestre, travelled to Russia, where the Argentine satellite was launched aboard a Russian rocket on Thursday. The take-off and separation of the satellite from the rocket went smoothly, and a few hours later, the uSAT-1 crossed the Pacific ocean and flew over Argentina.

The satellite is very small, a 35-by-35 cm. box that weighs 42 kgs. and flys 250 to 1,200 kilometres above the earth, taking high- quality photos.

Because of its size, it only takes photos when activated to do so. “It could take photos of neighbouring countries. But there isn’t any problem, they would be harmless photos, because this is a technological satellite, not a military one,” the Brigadier- General assured.

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