39089 - NEOSSAT

NEOSSAT is the first space telescope designed to search for hazardous Earth-crossing asteroids. The $24 million NEOSSat mission will scan the sky for asteroids lurking near Earth, including objects orbiting close to the sun, making their discoveries challenging for traditional ground-based telescopes. Engineers outfitted the suitcase-sized satellite with a baffle to allow the telescope to point closer to the sun than other observatories. Astronomers will try to pick out asteroids as they streak through a matrix of stars, detecting between four and 12 500-meter, or 1,640-foot, asteroids each month, plus smaller objects.

NEOSSat is the first follow up mission to the groundbreaking MOST (Microvariability and Oscillation of STars) spacecraft, a 60 kilogram satellite designed to measure the age of stars in our galaxy. NEOSSat also marks the first project using Canada's Multi-Mission Microsatellite Bus. CSA's Space Technology branch launched the Multi-Mission Bus project to capitalize on technology developed for the MOST project by making it adaptable to future satellite missions.

Facts in Brief

Launch Date: 2013-02-25
Launch Vehicle: PSLV-CA
Launch Site: Sriharikota, Canada