Göktürk-2

Göktürk-2 is a Turkish Earth observation satellite designed and developed by the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TÜBİTAK) and built by its Space Technologies Research Institute (TÜBİTAK UZAY) together with Turkish Aerospace Industries for the Turkish Ministry of National Defence. It was launched on 18 December 2012 from the Jiuquan launch area in China on a Long March 2D rocket and placed in a low Earth orbit of 686 km. Produced with 80 per cent indigenously developed technology and fully domestic software, it offers imagery at 2.5 m resolution in the panchromatic band, 10 m in the multispectral band and 20 m in the shortwave infrared band. Besides military reconnaissance it supports civil mapping and planning, land cover survey, geology, ecosystem monitoring, disaster management and coastal zone management. It is Turkey's second national satellite after RASAT and part of the Göktürk family of Earth observation satellites, alongside Göktürk-1 and Göktürk-3.