India’s launches 7 satellites - one with Google Nexus phone

The 44.4-metre tall Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle-C20 (PSLV-C20) rocket, with a lift-off weight of 229.7 tonnes, blasted off to launch into orbit seven satellites - one Indo-French and six foreign satellites.  It was a text book launch.  Watch the launch video captured from my apartment rooftop - an Android OS phone recording an Android OS satellite launch.
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The seven satellites together weigh 668.5 kg. The entire flight sequence - lift-off to the ejection of the seventh satellite at an altitude of 794 km above the earth - took around 22 minutes.

The main payload of the PSLV-C20 rocket will be the 407-kg Indo-French satellite SARAL (Satellite with ARGOS and ALTIKA) and six other satellites as piggy-back. 

The other six satellites the PSLV-C20 carried are:

• two Canadian satellite NEOSSat (Near Earth Object Space Surveillance Satellite),
• the world's first space telescope designed by Canadian Space Agency (CSA),
• and Sapphire satellite built by MacDonald, Dettwiler and Associates (MDA),
• BRITE and UniBRITE (both Austria),
• STRaND-1 (Britain), which carries the Google Nexus one smartphone, and,
• AAUSAT (Denmark).

Of most interest is the STRaND-1 (Surrey Training, Research, and Nanosatellite Demonstrator) - the world's first 'smart phone satellite' carrying Google Nexus One phone running Android operating system.

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