Turkey’s first pocketqube Grizu-263A started to send signals three hours after being launched into space. Grizu-263A was launched into space on aerospace company SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket.
“The first signals were successfully received from our satellite Grizu-263A. Our satellite is alive!!!” Grizu-263 developer Team said on Twitter.
Established in 2016 by engineering students from Zonguldak Bulent Ecevit University in northern Turkey, the Grizu-263 Space Team aims to work on space and satellite technologies and participate in international competitions.
The team was named after a firedamp explosion that killed 263 miners in the Kozlu district in 1992. The Turkish word for firedamp is “grizu”.
The pocketqube has a dimension of 5x5x5 cm. It is designed to operate in a low-Earth orbit of roughly 525 kilometres (326 miles) for four years and eight months.
The Grizu-263A will serve as an infrastructure to test and train constellation satellite projects.
