A formidable new radar satellite jointly developed by the United States and India launched Wednesday, designed to track subtle changes in Earth's land and ice surfaces and help predict both natural and human-caused hazards.

NISAR is the world's first radar imaging satellite to use two radar frequencies - the L-band provided by NASA and the S-band developed by ISRO - to track minute changes in the Earth's surface, including movements as small as a centimetre, the space agencies have said.