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[jamsat-news:2165] ANS-057 Weekly Bulletins


AMSAT NEWS SERVICE
ANS-057

ANS is a free, weekly, news and information service of AMSAT North
America, The Radio Amateur Satellite Corporation. ANS reports on the
activities of a worldwide group of Amateur Radio operators who share an
active interest in designing, building, launching and communicating
through analog and digital Amateur Radio satellites.

Please send any amateur satellite news or reports to:

ans-editor@amsat.org

In this edition:
* Cute Sat 1.7 Launched
* SuitSat Gone??
* AMSAT Newsreel Update
* ARISS Status - 20 February 2006


SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-057.01 Cute Sat 1.7 Launched

AMSAT News Service Bulletin 057.01
 From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
February 26, 2006
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-057.01

CUTE SAT 1.7 has been launched and has been heard on the air by various
stations throughout the world.
Information available at:
http://lss.mes.titech.ac.jp/ssp/cute1.7

It will have uplink packet capability on 1.2ghz and 144mhz with downlink
data on 437mhz. More info is available on the website.

The downlink for CW Beacon is 437.385. Listen fot it!

[ANS thanks the LSS team for the above
information]

/EX


SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-057.02 SuitSat Gone?

AMSAT News Service Bulletin 057.02
From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
February 26, 2006
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-057.02

As it become certain that SuitSat-1 had reached the end of its mission,
Frank, KA3HDO, who is AMSAT-VP for Human Spaceflight Programs, as well
as the ARISS International Chairman wrote an extensive summary of the
exciting worldwide teaching and learning opportunity.

Frank said, "SuitSat-1/Radioskaf/AO-54 the mission that has captured the
imagination of people and students around the world---is now a confirmed
silent key.  The outreach, press requests and visibility of SuitSat was
absolutely amazing and appears to be unprecedented for a ham radio event.
While the press requests are just now starting to wane, we expect that
you will continue to see SuitSat status reports and pictures in
magazines, websites and other literature over the next few months.

The last confirmed reception of the SuitSat voice audio was on Saturday,
February 18 by Bob King's station, VE6BLD in Canada.  The last confirmed
telemetry was received by Richard Crow's station, N2SPI in the USA.
Richard copied the SuitSat-1 voltage dropping precipitously to a low of
18.3 volts before vehicle stopped transmitting.  A graphic
representation of Richard's telemetry data showing the battery voltage
can be seen at http://www.amsat.org.

While the transmission part of the SuitSat experiment was not stellar,
SuitSat-1 has been tremendously successful in several areas.  Some of
these successes include:
- We captured the imagination of students and the general public
worldwide   through this unique experiment.
- The media attention to the SuitSat project was tremendous.
- We have had well over 9 million internet hits at http://www.suitsat.org.
- Our student's creative artwork, signatures and voices have been
carried in space and are on-board the spacesuit---the students are now
space travelers in the Suit as it circles the Earth.  This was a
collaboration  with the NASA Explorer Schools.
- The ARISS international team was able to fabricate, test and deliver a
  safe  ham radio system to the ISS team 3 weeks after the international
  space agencies agreed to allow SuitSat to happen.  This was a tremen-
  dous feat in of itself.

And most importantly,

- We successfully deployed an amateur radio satellite in a Spacesuit
from   the ISS, demonstrating to the space agencies that this can be
safely done. This engineering accomplishment will open new opportunities
for  small, low cost satellites in the future.

The AMSAT/ARISS team have been talking about a SuitSat-2.  Correcting
the signal strength issue would be a top priority for this flight.  So
would be a longer term power generation device, like solar arrays.  As
our thoughts mature on this, we will keep you informed of our plans.

SuitSat-1/Radioskaf/AO-54  represented a space pioneering effort.  While
we did not have total success, we captured the imagination of students
and the general public worldwide.  And we have learned a lot from this
activity. This will help us and others grow from this experience.

On behalf of the AMSAT, ARISS and SuitSat teams, I thank you all for
your help, encouragement and advice."

73,  Frank H. Bauer, KA3HDO
AMSAT-VP for Human Spaceflight Programs
ARISS International Chairman

[ANS thanks ARISS for the above adventure]

/EX


SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-057.03 AMSAT Newsreel Update

AMSAT News Service Bulletin 057.03
 From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
February 26, 2006
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-057.03

On the AMSAT website  http://www.amsat.org.  , there is a section where
you can see video newsreels of events and items of interest. They are
very well produced and professionaly put together.  The latest one
for February 2006 can be seen from the AMSAT website.  Plan on taking a
look and updating your facts about AMSAT. There are some very
interesting talks and ideas for presentations to all AMSAT members and
the area coordinators.

[ANS thanks Don, WB5EKU for the above information]

/EX


SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-057.04 ARISS Status - 20 February 2006

AMSAT News Service Bulletin 057.04
 From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
February 26, 2006
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-057.04

ARISS Status
February 20, 2006



1. Australia Contact Successful

On February 17, students at the Cosmos Centre Charleville in
Charleville, Australia experienced a successful ARISS contact with Bill
McArthur, KC5ACR, via the telebridge station WH6PN in Hawaii.  Eight
children asked 17 questions of the astronaut as an audience of 50 looked
on. The event was covered by Southern Cross TV, the Australian
Broadcasting Commission (ABC) which was broadcast nationwide, and the
local media.  The audio was webcast, courtesy of Verizon Conferencing,
and was fed through the EchoLink AMSAT (node 101 377) and JK1ZRW (node
277 208) conference rooms. Twenty-one connections were made to Echolink
from the following countries: Australia, Japan, Russia, USA, UK,
Netherlands, Slovak Republic, Czech Republic, and Thailand. Five
stations from Canada, Australia and Japan made connections to IRLP
Discovery Reflector 9010 and the audio was also streamed on
www.discoveryreflector.ca

2. Engineering Day Contact Successful

On Saturday, February 18, sixteen children attending the Discover
Engineering Family Day made contact with the Space Station via the
telebridge station, WH6PN, in Hawaii. Bill McArthur, KC5ACR, answered 16
questions. Prior to the event, the ARISS contact was publicized in the
Weekend edition of the Washington Post newspaper and was described on
many of the local TV
broadcast channels. Approximately 7000 people attended the event held in
the National Building Museum.  The contact audio was webcast and was fed
through the Echolink AMSAT (node 101 377) and JK1ZEW (node 277 208)
conference rooms and the IRLP Discovery Reflector 9010.  Eighteen
connections were made to Echolink from the USA, Canada, the UK,
Columbia, Japan, and the Czech Republic.

In addition to the contact, a team of volunteers from AMSAT supported
the ARISS booth the entire day of the Engineering Family Day function.
The team provided a hands-on view of the ham radio equipment used on
ISS, provided updates on the SuitSat project, and handed out information
on ham radio and the ARISS program to children and their parents and
guardians.

3. SuitSat Status

SuitSat was last heard from on Saturday, February 18 at 03:30 UTC. ARRL
ran an article covering the satellite痴 suspected demise entitled,
鉄uitSat-1 Battery Voltage May Be on Downward Slide. See:
http://www.arrl.org/news/stories/2006/02/17/5/?nc=1

4. News Article on Pine Ridge Contact

Naples News covered the ARISS contact between Bill McArthur and the NASA
Explorer Schools - Pine Ridge and Immokalee Middle Schools. The article,
鏑ive from Space,may be found at:
http://www.naplesnews.com/news/2006/feb/13/middle_school_students_chat_astronaut_he_orbits_ov/?local_news

5. ARRL Article on Dale High and DeGolyer Contacts

ARRL wrote a web story covering the Dale High School and DeGolyer
Elementary School contacts. To view, 釘ack-to-Back ARISS School Group
QSOs Attest to Ambitious Contact Schedule,see:
http://www.arrl.org/news/stories/2006/02/16/1/?nc=1

6. ARRL Article on New Astronauts

On February 15, ARRL ran a story entitled, 鉄everal new astronauts are
Amateur Radio licensees. See: http://www.arrl.org/

7. Astronaut Training Session

A second Amateur Radio training session has been tentatively scheduled
for the remaining 2004 astronaut class. The class is planned for Friday,
February 24. Astronauts Randy Bresnik, Jim Dutton, Shane Kimbrough, Tom
Marshburn, and Bobby Satcher will attend. Astronaut Chris Cassidy will
be scheduled for his second session at a later date.


[ANS thanks Carol, KB3LKI for the above information]


/EX


In addition to regular membership, AMSAT offers membership in the President's Club. Members of the President's Club, as sustaining donors to AMSAT Project Funds, will be eligible to receive additional benefits. Application forms are available from the AMSAT Office.

73, This week's ANS Editor,
Dee Interdonato, NB2F
nb2f at amsat dot org
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