The first Croatian satellite ‘CroCube’ was launched into orbit on Saturday

CroCube is a mission to create, test and launch the first Croatian nano- satellite, more precisely a satellite from the category of small satellites called CubeSat. The satellite is a 1U cube model (1U = 10 cm x 10 cm x 10 cm) with a total weight of about 1.1 kg, equipped with two cameras and a radio amateur transceiver.

After two delays, at 12:34 local time, the first Croatian satellite was launched into Earth's orbit aboard the Falcon nine space ship owned by Elon Musk's SpaceX Company, from a base in California. Croatia has now joined the list of European countries with its own satellite in space. The CroCube satellite will photograph the Earth for two years and conduct scientific measurements at an altitude of 510 kilometers. Project director Daniela Jović: "The CroCube is equipped with a camera and a technological experiment that was conceived of entirely in Croatia. We will receive numerous data, from photographs to data from the experiment, as well as its telemetry, various temperature readings and so on."

CroCube sent its first message back to earth at 3:15 local time. The satellite also has a small payload, a cubic millimeter of meteor that fell on Croatian soil. According to Jović amateurs and enthusiasts will be able to follow CroCube's movements easily: “All of the data will be freely available, so anyone with our mobile application will be able to follow its communications.”

The satellite will be in range for Croatian enthusiasts three times per day during its mission, until it is drawn in by the earth's gravitational pull, which will result in it burning up entirely on re-entry.

Source: HRT