First Israeli launch; possibly experimental surveillance mission. Experimental satellite 'Offeq-1'. Launch time 0934 GMT. Location: site on the coast south of Tel-Aviv. Launching organization: Israel Aircraft Industries, Ltd (IAI) and Israeli Space Agency (ISA). Function: 1) Experimentation in generation of solar power; 2) Experimentation in transmission reception from space; 3) Verification of system's ability to withstand vacuum and weightless conditions; 4) Data collection on space environment conditions and Earth's magnetic field.

The first satellite launch from a submarine. The Shtil-1 launch vehicle was a converted R-29RM (RSM-54) three stage liquid propellant submarine launched ballistic missile made by the Makeyev design bureau. The satellite payload is placed in the standard R-29RM reentry vehicle. The launch plaform was the K-407 Novomoskovsk, a 667BDRM Delfin class submarine of the Russian Northern Fleet's 3rd Flotilla. Launch was from the Barents Sea at 69.3 degrees N x 35.3 degrees E. The Shtil contained an Israeli instrument package.

Launch delayed from November 28. The Israeli commercial imaging satellite EROS A1 was owned by ImageSat (an Israeli-led company registered in the Netherlands Antilles) and built by IAI using the Ofeq-3 design. EROS A1 was placed in a sun-synchronous orbit together with the DS 5th stage. The 250 kg (dry mass) triaxially stabilized spacecraft carried a black and white high resolution (1.8 m) CCD camera, to obtain images (with terrain width of 12.6 km) of locations chosen by Israeli military or world-wide commercial clients, and downlink them at one of the 14 ground stations.

Military Observation satellite. Return to flight of the Shavit booster following a lauanch failure. Launch delayed from third quarter 2001. The three-stage Shavit rocket took off from Palmachim Air Force Base on the Israeli coast and flew westward to put the satellite in a retrograde orbit. The AUS-51 third stage solid motor entered a 262 x 774 km x 143.5 deg orbit and separated from the Ofeq satellite. Both coasted up to apogee at around 1620 UTC when Ofeq made a burn to increase its velocity by 33 m/s, raising the orbit to 369 x 771 km x 143.5 deg.

ABM Target. First Silver Sparrow target missile on a suborbital flight from an F-15 airplane over the Mediterranean Sea. Launched eastward towards the Israeli coast, for tests of Israeli missile defense radars. The flight's detection by Russian tracking systems led to some initial public consternation until the mission was acknowledged by Israel.