Polish “Eagle's Eye” will fly into space today. On Elon Musk's rocket

“The largest Polish satellite will be launched on August 16, at approximately 20:19 Polish time. This date was set by SpaceX, the launch service provider. EagleEye will be launched into Earth orbit on a Falcon 9 rocket from the Vandenberg base in California, as part of the Transporter-11 mission. The separation of the Polish satellite is planned for 21:38 our time,” Creotech Instruments SA reported on Thursday evening.

– After many years of work on the HyperSat satellite system, on which the first large Polish satellite is based, a key moment is coming. The Falcon 9 rocket will place EagleEye in space. This is a moment we have been waiting for a long time, together with the entire Polish space industry – said Grzegorz Brona, CEO of Creotech Instruments SA, quoted in the release. – For me personally, this will be a very special event. 12 years ago, when the company was founded, we announced that our goal was to gain the ability to design and produce fully Polish satellites. At that time, no one believed in it. And now, after building laboratories, production facilities, and above all, attracting excellent people to Creotech, on whose shoulders rests the mission of building EagleEye, we are ready – he added.

The mission will begin with EagleEye being placed in an orbit of about 510 kilometers, from where the satellite will be lowered to a very low orbit (VLEO – Very Low Earth Orbit) of about 350 km using an ion engine. “Its operational capabilities and Earth imaging capabilities will also be verified there. Creotech Instruments engineers will supervise the entire mission from the Mission Operations Center, which is located at the Company's headquarters in Warsaw,” the company reported.

EagleEye is the largest and most advanced Polish satellite in history. It will enable photographing the Earth with an exceptionally high resolution of up to one meter per pixel. It is based on the proprietary HyperSat platform, which is already a key element of a number of projects at the national and European level. “The satellite has been equipped with an optical telescope from the Polish company Scanway, which enables taking pictures of the Earth's surface in the visible (VIS) and near infrared (NIR) bands, as well as an instrument computer developed by the Space Research Center of the Polish Academy of Sciences,” it was reported.

“The satellite weighs around 55 kilograms, which is the total mass of all Polish satellites that have been created since the beginning of our participation in space exploration. This is a breakthrough project for the entire Polish space sector and, at the same time, an important step in the development of national competences in the design, construction, integration and launch of small satellites,” we read in the release. After unfolding the solar panels, the instrument measures 55 cm x 150 cm x 90 cm.

As Creotech experts point out, EagleEye “has a chance to introduce Poland to the elite group of countries with the ability to create such advanced space systems for domestic needs, the European Space Agency and customers from all over the world. So far, only eight entities in Europe have proven their ability to build and test a satellite weighing at least 50 kg in space”. – Designing and building a satellite of this size in Poland required unique skills and experience. We are managing a mission that is of great importance for the entire domestic space sector. We are opening the door for domestic entities to the rapidly growing and profitable market of designing, building, integrating and launching small satellites into Earth orbit. It is a great honor and at the same time a responsibility – emphasized Marcin. MazurkaEagleEye project manager, quoted in the project description.

The launch was supposed to take place earlier, but was postponed due to problems with SpaceX, owned by billionaire Elon Musk. Last July, during a routine mission of the Falcon 9 rocket, the second-stage engine failed. The suspension of flights lasted about two weeks.