Fact Check: Did NASA recently launch the world's smallest satellite designed by a Tamil Nadu student?
A post claiming that NASA recently launched the world’s smallest satellite designed by Tamil Nadu’s 18-year-old student Rifath Farooq is going viral on social media.
By Newsmeter Network Published on 27 March 2022 11:37 AM GMT
Hyderabad: A post claiming that NASA recently launched the world's smallest satellite designed by Tamil Nadu's 18-year-old student Rifath Farooq is going viral on social media. Further, the post accuses all mainstream media channels of turning a blind eye to India's achievement in rocket and space technology while busy promoting 'The Kashmir Files'.
Fact Check
The claim is false.
NewsMeter conducted a reverse image search and found that the same photo was tweeted by ANI on 22 June 2017.
ANI had reported that it was the photo of Tamil Nadu students rejoicing the launch of their 64-gram satellite, the world's smallest satellite, that was launched by NASA. News 18 had also tweeted the same photo with a similar description.
We found that several news channels had published articles and videos about this in 2017.
According to these reports, on 21 June 2017, NASA launched the world's smallest satellite designed by Tamil Nadu student Rifath Shaarook and his team. The 64-gram light-weight satellite was named 'Kalamsat', after the former President of India Dr. A.P.J Abdul Kalam. Rifath Shaarook designed the structure of this satellite completely with 3D printed and reinforced carbon fibre polymer. The main purpose of this 64-gram satellite was to demonstrate the performance of 3D carbon fibre. (Source: Indian Express, BBC, WIO News)
Click here and here to watch interviews of Rifathh Shaarook after the successful launch of his satellite.
Hence, the claim that NASA recently launched the world's smallest satellite designed by a Tamil Nadu student is misleading. While NASA did launch the world's smallest satellite designed by Tamil Nadu student Rifath Shaarook, it was in 2017 and not recently.
