Ham Radio assisted in Reactivating Three Decade Old NASA Satellite

Ham radio has assisted in reactivating an over three decade old NASA satellite.

The U-K newspaper the Daily Mail says that several radio amateurs were involved with Project Reboot in regaining control on May 29th of the 35 year old abandoned International Sun-Earth Explorer 3 spacecraft. Hams named in the article include Dennis Wingo, KD4ETA; Achim Vollhardt, DH2VA, and Mario Lorenz DL5MLO.

The International Sun-Earth Explorer was launched in 1978 to study Earth’s magnetosphere. It carries thirteen scientific instruments to measure plasmas, energetic particles, waves, and fields. As of this past May, all but one is thought to be functional. An on-board data handling system gathers the scientific and engineering information from all systems in the spacecraft. It then formats this information into a serial stream for transmission back to Earth by an on-board 5 watt transmitter.

After completing its main mission, the satellite was repurposed in 1983 to study two comets. At that time it was renamed the International Cometary Explorer and has been in a heliocentric orbit since then, traveling just slightly faster than Earth. It’s finally catching up to our planet from behind, and will be closest to Earth this August.

Now, KD4ETA has released an update on the attempts by the projects volunteers, including the radio amateurs, to gain control of the spacecraft. According to Wingo, the probe has been successfully commanded into engineering telemetry mode. He noted the job done by DH2VA and also Phil Karn, KA9Q, to make this happen. Karn is well known in the amateur radio community for his work on the KA9Q Network Operating System, the early 9600 bit FSK radio modems, and more recently, the introduction of forward error correction into the Amateur Satellite Service.

As we go to air, Project Reboot members are working on deadline. If they get the spacecraft to change its orbit quickly, it can use the Moon's gravity to get back into a useful halo orbit. If not, the fear is that for all practical purposes the International Sun-Earth Explorer 3 could be lost. We will keep you posted.

For the Amateur Radio Newsline, I’m Heather Embee, KB3TZD, in Berwick, Pennsylvania.

--

The actual first command to the revived International Sun-Earth Explorer 3 spacecraft was successfully sent from the Arecibo Radio Observatory in Puerto Rico using the facilities 305 meter dish. This after the volunteer team installed the needed modulator, demodulator and power amplifier to make contact and control of the satellite possible. More is on the web at tinyurl.com/reboot-project (AMSAT-UK, Daily Mail, Southgate)

Artsat One Invader Reports Needed

Masahiro Sanada, JI1ZR reports the amateur radio CubeSat Artsat One Invader also known as CO-77 is in trouble and he is asks radio hams world-wide to keep an ear open for the bird and to report anything heard.

According to Sanada, the satellite does not reply to commands from the control station and those involved in the project are trying to find out why in hope of finding a fix or work-around. The downlink frequency for Artsat One Invader is 437.325MHz. If you hear the bird please send that information via a form on the web at api.artsat.jp/report

OSCAR-11 / UOSAT-2 Celebrates 30 Years in Orbit

UOSAT-OSCAR-11 has now been in orbit for 30 years and remarkably its signal on 145.826 MHz FM (AFSK 1200 bps ASCII) is still being received.

OSCAR-11, also known as UOSAT-2, was designed and built by a team of engineers at the University of Surrey in Guildford, Surrey, UK as the successor to OSCAR-9 / UOSAT-1 (see Hobby Electronics August 1981).
It was launched from the Western Test Range at Vandenberg Air Base, in Lompoc, California along with LANDSAT-5 on a Delta 3920 rocket on March 1, 1984.

OSCAR-11 was the most rapidly designed OSCAR, going from inception to launch in only five months. It was also the first amateur satellite to carry a digital communications package into Earth orbit, and the first to be controlled by a CPU running software written in the high-level programming language “Forth”.

OSCAR-11 carries beacons in three amateur radio bands.

The 145.826 MHz beacon transmits FM Audio Frequency Shift Keying (AFSK) 1200 bps ASCII data. It the early years it also transmitted a voice message from the digitalker experiment.

The 435.025 MHz beacon transmitted either 1200 bps FM AFSK or 4800 bps PSK data. This beacon was used to downlink information from the Digital Store and Readout (DSR) Experiment, which includes CCD Earth image data, results from the Particle Wave Experiment, and engineering data from the RCA COSMAC 1802 CPU.

The 2401.5 MHz beacon transmitted FM and PSK signals. Antenna polarization for all three beacon transmitters is left-hand circular (LHCP). Only the 145.826 MHz beacon is now operational.

Addition OSCAR-11 information
http://www.g3cwv.co.uk/oscar11.htm

OSCAR-11 page on the DK3WN satellite blog at
http://www.dk3wn.info/p/?cat=47

SSTL Blog – Happy 30th Birthday to UOSAT-2
http://www.sstl.co.uk/Blog/March-201...ay-to-UoSAT-2-

OSCAR-9 and OSCAR-11 TV News Reports
http://amsat-uk.org/2011/10/30/oscar...-news-reports/

BBC Micro ASTRID UoSAT receiver and AMSAT-UK Software Library
http://amsat-uk.org/2011/12/11/
bbc-micro-and-amsat-uk-software-library/



http://www.southgatearc.org/news/201...s_in_orbit.htm

Launch of Two Hundred 437MHz Satellites

The largest ever launch of 437 MHz satellites is planned for March 16 at 0841 UT when 200 Sprite satellites will be launched on the SpaceX Falcon 9 CRS 3 mission
They will be deployed into a 325×315 km 51.5 degree inclination orbit. You should be able to watch the launch live on NASA TV at http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/nasatv
A Sprite is a tiny, 3.5 by 3.5 cm, single-board spacecraft that was developed by Zac Manchester KD2BHC. It has a microcontroller, radio, and solar cells and is capable of carrying single-chip sensors, such as thermometers, magnetometers, gyroscopes, and accelerometers.
The 200 Sprites are carried in a 3U CubeSat called KickSat. They are stacked atop a spring-loaded pusher and secured by a nichrome burn wire system.
On reaching orbit KickSat will perform a de-tumble maneuver and establish communication with Cornell University’s ground station. After check-out, the spacecraft will be put in a sun-pointing attitude and spun up to maintain that attitude.
A command signal from the ground station will then trigger the deployment and the Sprites will be released as free-flying spacecraft. After deployment, telemetry and sensor measurements from the individual Sprites will be received through Cornell’s ground station in Ithaca, NY, as well as several other amateur ground stations around the world.
Due to the low orbit Sprites will have a short lifetime before they re-enter the atmosphere and burn up. In the best-case scenario the orbital lifetime could be six weeks but realistically it may be considerably shorter depending on atmospheric conditions.
All Sprites operate on a single frequency of 437.240 MHz and use Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA). The transmitter runs 10 mW output of Minimum Shift Keying (MSK) modulated binary data with each data bit modulated as a 511 bit Pseudo-Random Number (PRN) sequence. The ITU emission designator is 50K0G1D.
The KickSat CubeSat has downlinks on 437.505 MHz and 2401-2436.2 MHz.
KickSat Sprite Ground Station by Andy Thomas G0SFJ http://kicksat.wordpress.com/support...round-station/
British Interplanetary Society: Sprite Technical Summary http://www.bis-space.com/2013/03/09/...hnical-summary
KickSat project information http://zacinaction.github.io/kicksat/
KickSat on KickStarter https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/zacinaction/
kicksat-your-personal-spacecraft-in-space/
Check this site for the latest CRS 3 launch date http://spaceflightnow.com/tracking/


http://www.southgatearc.org/news/201...satellites.htm

Cubesats Deployed from International Space Station

Astronaut Koichi Wakata, KC5ZTA, has successfully deployed the first of the 33 CubeSats that were launched to the International Space Station in the Cygnus freighter on January 9th. The Tuesday, February 11th deployment consisted of the first two of the Flock-1 constellation of 28 Dove CubeSats made by Planet Labs.

In addition to the 28 Planet Labs micro-birds, there are also four amateur radio CubeSats waiting to be placed on-orbit. These are LituanicaSat-1, LitSat-1, ArduSat-2 and UAPSat-1 as well as a 915 MHz CubeSat SkyCube. All are planned to be deployed in the coming weeks.

Cape II Amateur Radio Satellite Cube OSCAR 75 or LO-75

The Cape II ham radio satellite is now known as the University of Louisiana OSCAR 75 or LO-75. This according to OSCAR Number Administrator Bill Tynan, W3XO, who recently informed AMSAT mentor Nick Pugh, K5QXJ, of the decision.

The CAPE II ham satellite operates on 145.825 MHz FM with a CW beacon signing the call W5UL. The bird also includes a digipeaters, text to speech operation, a simplex repeater, e-mail and tweet functions. The ground station software can be downloaded at www.ulcape.org

Going to Space: Send Your Name to the Asteroid Bennu

If you have ever wanted to vicariously into space, now is your chance. NASA is inviting people around the world including ham radio operators to submit their names to be etched on a microchip aboard a spacecraft headed to the asteroid Bennu in 2016.

The "Messages to Bennu" microchip will travel to the asteroid aboard the Origins Spectral Interpretation Resource Identification Security Regolith Explorer spacecraft. The robotic mission will spend more than two years at the asteroid, which has a width of only about 1,760 feet. The spacecraft will collect a sample of Bennu's surface and then return it to Earth .

The deadline to submit your name online is Sept. 30, 2014. Participants who submit their names to the "Messages to Bennu" campaign will be able to print a certificate of appreciation to document their involvement. To submit your name for inclusion on this mission please take your web browser to planetary.org/bennu. While there are no instructions as to how to how to include your callsign, we found it simple to just put it right after your last name. (ANS, NASA)

ISS Celebrated its 15th Birthday

The International Space Station celebrated its 15th birthday on Wednesday, November 20th. This marking the day in 1998 when a rocket lifted to orbit the first piece of what is now the largest man made structure ever built in space.
The International Space Station began construction with the arrival on-orbit of the Russian built Zarya Module. This lead to the ongoing international mission to build the orbital outpost one piece at a time.
Today, the ISS is about the size of a football field with roughly the same amount of livable space as a six-bedroom house. Amateur Radio became a part of the Space Station two weeks after the first two licensed ham radio operators took up residence in it on Expedition One. Since then hams have taken part in all 38 expeditions to this point.
Five different space agencies representing fifteen countries have contributed to construction of the $100 billion orbital outpost.

LADEE Spacecraft goes into Lunar Orbit

NASA's Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer or LADEE spacecraft fired its engines Sunday morning, October 6th, slowing it enough to be captured by lunar gravity and placing it into orbit around the Moon. Once given the green light the spacecraft will begin its mission to study the Moon's exotic and almost transparent atmosphere, which is highly affected by space weather. That information will be sent by radio back to Earth for further analysis.

LES 1

 Phil Williams, G3YPQ, is an Amateur Radio Astronomer in
North Cornwall in the U.K..  According to reports he
accidentally picked up the signal and after cross checking
with various lists, he identified it as LES 1.

LES 1 was built by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
and launched in 1965. The satellite failed to reach its
intended orbit owing to a wiring error and has been drifting
out of control ever since.

Williams ran across it while monitoring near 237 MHz when he
noticed a signal with a peculiar signal drift caused by the
bird tumbling end over end every 4 seconds as the solar
panels became shadowed by the satellites engine.  Williams
said that gives the signal a particularly ghostly sound as
the voltage from the solar panels fluctuates.

The LES 1 satellite is about the size of a small car and is
not likely to re-enter the atmosphere for a long time as the
orbit is still relatively high.  It poses no threat other
than that caused by the thousands of other pieces of space
junk currently in orbit.  By now its likely that the on
board batteries have now disintegrated so its likely that
some other component failure has caused the transmitter to
start up when its in sunlight bringing the ghost satellite
back to life.

Smartphone-Sat- STRAND-1

STRAND-1 AMATEUR RADIO SMARTPHONE CUBESAT TO LAUNCH FEBRUARY 25

The BBC says that the world’s first 'smartphone-sat' project called STRAND-1 will be ready to launch at the end of February. The STRAND-1 CubeSat will carry a Google Nexus One Android smartphone into space to demonstrate the feasibility of using cheap smartphone’s electronics to control a spacecraft.

Also included will be a software-based speech synthesizer to commemorate the U-O-SAT family of amateur radio satellites that were launched in the 1980′s. There will also be an amateur radio AX.25 packet radio downlink on 437.575 MHz.

The STRAND-1 satellite was built in Guildford in the United Kingdom by volunteers from the Surrey Space Centre and Surrey Satellite Technology Limited in their spare time. It is planned to be launched on February 25th into a 785 km orbit by the Indian Space Research Organization rocket. More is on-line at www.amsat-uk.org and we will have more ham radio space related news later on in this weeks Amateur Radio Newsline report. (AMSAT-UK)

ARISS has switched after experiencing issues w/Kenwood D700

ARISS has switched radios. After experiencing issues with the Kenwood D700 on two consecutive school contacts, Amateur Radio on the International Space Station operations have announced plans to use the Ericsson radio on the Columbus module for all contacts until problems with the D700 are resolved.

Frank Bauer, KA3HDO, is AMSAT's Vice President for Human Spaceflight Programs. He says that for some reason signals from the Service Module Kenwood D700 radio are much diminished. He notes that a recent contact with Israel had low audio levels. Another contact with the Hospital for Sick Children was even worse. Only one student was able to talk to Chris Hadfield before signals on the ground were lost even though the crew reports hearing the ground station well.

It should be noted that both these contacts were with made using telebridge stations which have above average gear. Also astro-ham Hadfield used the space stations IP Phone, immediately after the hospital radio contact and answered all the student's questions so that all was not lost. A later contact with a school in Japan using the Columbus Module Ericsson radio proved very successful. (ANS, ARISS)

SimpleSat Look Down from W9KE

SimpleSat

Tom, W9KE has written a program which looks for satellite passes where communications between two different grid locations is possible.

Tom invites interested testers to download the program from http://www.tomdoyle.org/simplesat/simplesat.html.

It is a zip file. Un-Zip the files into a folder and run the SimpleSat.exe file.

No install is required and the three files it will create are stored in the same folder as the SimpleSat.exe program. It does nothing to the registry. It downloads sat data from the net so use a computer connected to the net when you run the program.

Contact Tom directly at tomdoyle1948@gmail.com with any questions or comments

SimpleSat Look Down’ is a satellite tracking program designed for ease of use and is particularly well suited for demonstrations, educational environments and people new to the satellite hobby.

This program requires .Net 4 so you will have to install it if you do not have it installed already. Not sure ? Try running the program – if it runs you have it – if you do not have it you will see a message box telling you that you do not have it. Unlike most ham radio programs this program uses most all of the new bells and whistles of .Net 4 and WPF. Unfortunately this means that it may not run on a few computers even thought most all the other ham programs run just fine.

http://www.microsoft.com/net/download

The program runs well on Windows 8, Windows 7, Vista or XP. How well the program runs depends on a couple of things: Your computer speed – if you have an old computer that does not run very well this program will probably not run well. Your internet connection – if you have a poor internet connection the Tracking Map scroll will not be very smooth.

If the vertical screen resolution on your computer is less that 768 pixels you will have some problems. Many netbooks have only 600 pixels of vertical screen resolution so they may not be entirely satisfactory. I have run the program on a old netbook running XP that has a 768 pixel vertical resolution emulation mode for its 600 pixel screen and it works great.

Here are links to three videos you should watch before running the program. The videos are in high def and look decent in full screen HD. You can access this same page from the ‘Help’ button on the program main screen.

http://youtu.be/PYUmiUDr6YA

http://youtu.be/uZWTjMm9mwY

http://youtu.be/RQr0Efnatos

FAQ:

Q: Does the program require internet access.
A: If you do not have internet access the program will work but the tracking map will not
be displayed.

Q: Why don’t you just cache the map data.
A: Still need internet access to authenticate my Bing Maps license number.

After you have looked at the video and read everything on this page you are ready to try the program. The program does not have to be installed on your computer. It does not store files all over your computer or alter your registry. It runs fine off a modern USB thumb drive. This is actually quite handy as you can take the program with you in your pocket.

Unzip the zip file onto your computer – the desktop works just fine as a location. Go into the extracted folder and double-click on the .exe file. There is an online help button which you my want to try out. SimpleSatLookDown.zip

Version with rotor control – beta version. Click on the ‘Help’ button on the main program window for information on the rotor control function. SimpleSatLookDownRotor1.0.zip

HORYU-2 Satellite

Amateurs Asked to Listen for HORYU-2 Satellite:

The Japanese HORYU-2 http://kitsat.ele.kyutech.ac.jp/index_e_new.html research satellite was launched May 17 at 1639 UTC as part of a mission that included the JAXA climate observation satellite Shizuku. HORYU-2 was built by students at the Kyushu Institute of Technology (KIT) and it carries the call sign JG6YBW. The satellite will conduct a variety of experiments including high-voltage power generation and space debris measurements. Amateurs have been asked to monitor HORYU-2's Morse code and 1200-baud AX.25 packet telemetry at 437.375 MHz. Telemetry decoding software is available for download http://kitsat.ele.kyutech.ac.jp/Documents/ground_station/Horyu2%20Data_Analysis_Program_japanese.zip. To encourage hams to submit reports, KIT will conduct a monthly prize drawing. Details are available here http://kitsat.ele.kyutech.ac.jp/Documents/ground_station/english/Receive_competition_eng.pdf.

Source:

The ARRL 

Japan will be Launching 16 Educational Ham-Sats

The first of the new birds to be launched will be the
amateur radio satellite HORYU-2 built by students at the
Kyushu Institute of Technology.  Its mission is to take
pictures of the Earth using a small C-MOS camera called
SCAMP that was developed by the University of Surrey in the
UK.  The SCAMP camera takes a 640x480 pixel picture in the
popular JPEG format. That means from 700 km altitude, one
pixel corresponds to 1.6 km.

HORYU-2 will be followed in July by the transport of several
items to the International Space Station.  This mission will
deliver the Japanese Experiment Module Small Satellite
Orbital Deployer or JEM along with the Japanese CubeSats WE-
WISH, FITSAT-1 and RAIKO.  These CubeSats should be deployed
from the ISS in September using the JEM and robot arm.

FITSAT-1 may be the most interesting of these.  It will use
a neodymium magnet for attitude control.  It will also have
multiple downlinks.  These include CW on 437.250 MHz, AX.25
on 437.445 MHz and a 4 watt high speed data transmitter on
5840 MHz.  The latter is capable of sending a 640 by 480 VGA
JPEG image in 6 seconds.

In addition to its other experiments, FITSAT-1 will also
carry a set of high power LED's that will be driven with
100W pulses to produce extremely bright flashes.  It is
hoped, will be observable by the unaided eye or with small
binoculars from the ground.  Both the 5840 MHz and optical
downlinks have a high power consumption so it may be that
they are only activated only over Japan.

In December the TSUBAME satellite is planned to be launched
on a Japanese H-IIA booster. It will carry a CW beacon on
437.250 MHz and AX.25 packet at 1200 and 9600 bit per second
telemetry on 437.505 MHz.  The remaining satellites will be
placed into orbit on subsequent  flights.

Next-Gen Weather Satellites to Improve Tornado Warnings

I meant to post this a couple of weeks ago.

Feb 29, 2012: When you read the following paragraph, consider the following: Tornado season hasn't even started yet. On Jan. 22 and 23, 2012, more than 37 tornadoes struck the southern USA. Ten of them tore across the Lower Mississippi Valley into Alabama. Worst hit were St. Clair and Jefferson County, Ala., where 2 people were killed, about 100 others injured, and at least $30 million in damage was done. It was a chilling reminder of the April 2011 onslaught of deadly tornadoes that took a staggering toll across southern and Midwestern states.

In southern parts of the USA, tornado season tends to peak in springtime. Yet January 2012 produced 73 winter tornadoes -- third most of any January in recorded history. Most of them struck southern states. And since over a quarter of the incredible 1,688 twisters confirmed across the US in 2011 occurred in the four-state region of Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi and Tennessee, residents there are becoming ever more wary of darkening skies.

"Even with our advances in science and communications, we can still be surprised by the deadliest storms," says NOAA scientist Steve Goodman. "But NOAA is working with NASA and university researchers to give more lead time in tornado warnings."

Southern tornadoes are especially insidious and challenging to track. The hilly, forested terrain in southern states makes an approaching twister harder to spot than in the flat Midwest. In the south you might not see the first evidence of an approaching tornado until it's almost in your back yard.

An Alabama resident describes the scene just before one of the April 2011 twisters struck near his home: "Suddenly, all the trees in my back yard corkscrewed violently, in unison, toward the northwest." Moments later, the storm was there.

Rain wrapped tornadoes are especially hard to see, as are night-time tornadoes. And records indicate that southern tornadoes often strike at night.

To reduce the surprise, NOAA and NASA² are developing the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite-R, or "GOES-R series," with the first expected to launch in late 2015. These next-generation weather satellites bristle with state-of-the-art instruments for improved scouting of these killer storms, even at night.

Tornadoes are, by their very nature, difficult to pin down. The Advanced Baseline Imager (ABI) on GOES-R will improve meteorologists' ability to assess conditions that spawn twisters. Compared to current GOES imagers, the ABI provides twice the spatial resolution, three times as many channels of information, and more than five times the update rate.

"ABI will give us a much clearer picture of the clouds – where and how tall they are, how much and what kind of moisture they hold, and how they are moving and intensifying," says NOAA research meteorologist Tim Schmit.

Most importantly, ABI can better detect the super-cold "overshooting tops" that mean severe weather is imminent. "Overshooting tops portend huge energy inside the cloud – it takes tremendous energy and upward velocity to poke through the lid of the tropopause," explains Schmit.

"During episodes of severe weather, ABI can show conditions every 30 to 60 seconds. The system in use now only shows them every 7.5 minutes. And in normal mode, ABI will send readings over the continental U.S. every 5 minutes as opposed to every 15-30 minutes."

Lightning is another key to tornadoes.

"Studies show that sudden changes in the total lightning correlate with [the onset of] tornadoes," says Goodman.

Detecting lightning is a new specialty of GOES-R.

"GOES-R's Geostationary Lightning Mapper, or GLM, will see all the lightning: cloud-to-ground, cloud-to-cloud, and inside each cloud. And since this is the first time we'll have lightning detection from geostationary orbit, it means GOES-R will constantly monitor and map the lightning across the western hemisphere."

The GLM is expected to give 7 more minutes of lead time in tornado warnings. Average lead time now is 13 minutes.

"With GOES-R you'll have upwards of 20 minutes to get to a safe haven."

That sure beats standing in your back yard, in the dark, waiting for the trees to twist.

Source: http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2012/29feb_tornadosurprise/

RS-39 Now in Orbit.; Reception Reports Needed

The Chibis-M microsatellite, also known as RS-39, was placed on-orbit from a Russian Progress M cargo spacecraft on Tuesday January 24th. The satellite is designed to study atmospheric phenomena such as Terrestrial Gamma Ray Flashes associated with lightning.

RS-39 also carries CW beacons on 435.215 and 435.315 MHz. Hams hearing these signals are being asked to submit reception reports via e-mail to the Space Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences at amateur-rs39 (at) chibis (dot) cosmos (dot) ru. Each report will be acknowledged with a special QSL card.

We will have more ham radio space related news later on in this week’s Amateur Radio Newsline report.

ARISSat-1/KEDR

NASA will have live coverage of the spacewalk that will see the deployment of the amateur radio satellite ARISSat-1/KEDR.
HOUSTON --
Two cosmonauts will conduct a six-hour spacewalk on Wednesday, Aug. 3, to continue outfitting the Russian segment of the International Space Station. NASA Television will broadcast the spacewalk beginning at 9 a.m. CDT.

Expedition 28 Russian Flight Engineers Sergei Volkov and Alexander Samokutyaev will install laser communications equipment and replace experiments on the Zvezda service module. They also will retrieve a rendezvous antenna, relocate a boom structure to aid future spacewalks and deploy a small satellite equipped with an amateur radio transmitter and a student-built experiment.

The duo will wear Russian Orlan spacesuits and will emerge from the Pirs docking compartment airlock at about 9:30 a.m. The spacewalk will be the third for Volkov, who performed two spacewalks as Expedition 17 commander in 2008. This will be the first spacewalk for Samokutyaev.

For NASA TV downlink, schedule and streaming video information, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/ntv

For information about the International Space Station, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/station

NASA needs Amateur Radio Operators

NASA is asking for help from the Amateur Radio Community.
I think this is really cool.
------------------------------------------------
HUNTSVILLE, Ala. -- Wednesday, Jan. 19 at 11:30 a.m. EST, engineers at Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., confirmed that the NanoSail-D nanosatellite ejected from Fast Affordable Scientific and Technology Satellite, FASTSAT. The ejection event occurred spontaneously and was identified this morning when engineers at the center analyzed on board FASTSAT telemetry. The ejection of NanoSail-D also has been confirmed by ground-based satellite tracking assets.

Amateur ham operators are asked to listen for the signal to verify NanoSail-D is operating. This information should be sent to the NanoSail-D dashboard at: http://nanosaild.engr.scu.edu/dashboard.htm. The NanoSail-D beacon signal can be found at 437.270 MHz.

Further Reading; click here

Follow the NanoSail-D mission operation on Twitter at:

http://twitter.com/nanosaild
For additional information on the time line of the NanoSail-D deployment visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/501204main_NSD2_timeline_sequence.pdf
To learn more about FASTSAT and the NanoSail-D missions visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/smallsats

SO-67 FM Suspended

Slow day for me today. Getting ready for the Christmas Holiday. The kids are home from school and the DX bands are already showing some congestion.

Got this in the E-Mail box this morning

Johann Lochner, ZR1CBC, reports that the FM Amateur Radio transponder on SO-67 is being temporarily suspended due to a probable radiation event.

On the AMSAT bulletin board he writes:

Last week the flash boot memory of a CAN controller on Sumbandila was corrupted by a probable radiation event. It does not affect satellite health but prevents activation of the amateur radio repeater, as the particular script detects an anomaly and aborts.

The same problem also occurred in October of 2009 and was corrected. However, the fix requires time consuming effort, which cannot be exerted immediately.

SO-67 repeater activations are therefore suspended. We apologize for any disappointment and hope to return to normal operations somewhere in January.

73 de ZR1CBC, Johann.

AMSAT Bulletin Board AMSAT-BB
http://www.amsat.org/amsat-new/tools/maillist/

Southern African Amateur Radio Satellite Association (SA AMSAT)
http://www.amsatsa.org.za/