Global satellite called GlobalSat for DRR was proposed to be named after former Indian President Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam who passed away on 27 July 2015.
The satellite to be used for earth observation and disaster risk reduction will be renamed as UN Kalam GlobalSat.
The proposal to name the satellite after Dr. Kalam was made by Milind Pimprikar, Chairman of CANEUS (CANada-Europe-US-Asia) headquartered in Montreal, Canada.
Tribute to Kalam’s World Space Vision-2050
The renaming of GlobalSat after Kalam will be a tribute to his vision, who in his World Space Vision-2050 had envisaged space faring nations joining hands to find solutions to mankind’s major problems such as natural disasters, energy and water scarcity, health-care education issues and weather prediction.
The proposed GlobalSat will be formally adopted by more than 150 world leaders at the UN Session in New York in September 2015.
About GlobalSat for DRR
- It is a UN-driven global initiative on sharing space technology for disaster risk reduction.
- The launch of this satellite was mooted at the third UN World Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction held at Sendai in Japan in March 2015.
- The proposal for GlobalSat was mooted by CANEUS in cooperation with UN agencies like UN Office for Outer Space Affairs, the UN International Strategy for Disaster Reduction, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the World Bank.
Reason Behind the proposal
The proposal came in response to the need for a globally interconnected disaster and environmental management system since no single country can afford to develop a complete set of sensors and satellite systems needed for forecasting, monitoring and mitigating disasters.
About CANEUS
CANEUS was founded in 1999 to develop a common platform for space technology solutions for natural and man-made disaster management.
