AMSAT NEWS SERVICE
ANS-353
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:
* Straight Key Night
* This month's satellite awards
* XW-1 1 year anniversary
* AMSAT-UK FUNcube Needs Help
* ARISS Status December 13, 2010
* Satellite Shorts
* Thanks for your support
SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-353.01
Straight Key Night
AMSAT News Service Bulletin 353.01
From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
December 19, 2010
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-353.01
STRAIGHT KEY NIGHT ON OSCAR 2011
You are cordially invited to participate in Straight Key Night on
OSCAR 2011, conducted by AMSAT for radio amateurs throughout the
world.
This year's event is dedicated to the memory of Dick Peacock, W2GFF,
who died in 2010 aged 91. Dick was an active satellite operator in
the 1970s and 1980s, mostly on CW and usually with a straight key.
He was also active on 50 MHz and the HF bands, and could always be
counted on for a kind word and a friendly QSO.
There are no rules, no scoring and no logs required. Just operate CW
on any OSCAR satellite, using a straight hand key, from 0000 UTC to
2400 UTC on 1 January 2011, working as many SKN stations as you can.
In keeping with the friendly nature of this event, each participant
is asked to nominate one of the operators worked for "Best Fist."
It is not necessary that your nominee have the best fist of anyone
you heard, just of those you worked. Please send your nomination to
W2RS via email at w2rs@amsat.org.
Those nominated will be recognized in an ANS bulletin to be publish-
ed in early February, and in The AMSAT Journal.
[ANS thanks Ray, W2RS for the above information]
/EX
SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-353.02
This month's satellite awards
AMSAT News Service Bulletin 353.02
From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
December 19, 2010
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-353.02
Here are the awards that I have processed over the last month. This will be
the last posting for 2010.
The following have entered into the Satellite Communicators Club for making
their first satellite QSO.
Alan Murray, Jr., N1ZWL
Richard Lewis, KG6ZVC
The following have earned the AMSAT Communications Achievement Award.
Boris Lanca, 9A2GA #525
Paul Gagnon, N6MA #526
Rick Tejera, K7TEJ #527
Jim Bennett, KE4KOL #528
Tom Deeble, KA6SIP #529
Glenn Barr, WB0KFC #530
The following have earned the AMSAT Sexagesimal Award
Paul Gagnon, N6MA #158
The following have earned the South Africa Satellite Communications
Achievement award
Nick Kucij, KB1RVT #US157
Boris Lanca, 9A2GA #US158
Rick Tejera, K7TEJ #US159
Jim Bennett, KE4KOL #US160
Tom Deeble, KA6SIP #US161
Glenn Barr, WB0KFC #US162
To see all the awards visit
http://www.amsat.org or
http://www.amsatnet.comBruce Paige, KK5DO
[ANS thanks Bruce, KK5DO, for the above information]
/EX
SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-353.03
XW-1 1 year anniversary
AMSAT News Service Bulletin 353.03
From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
December 19, 2010
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-353.03
HOPE-OSCAR 68 HO-68 Commemorates First Anniversary
This week AMSAT China noted the first anniversary of XW-1, also
known as Hope-Oscar 68 HO-68 with an announcement from Michael
Chen, BD5RV/4 at AMSAT-China.
AMSAT President Barry Baines, WD4ASW remarked that HO-68 was a
significant milestone for both amateur radio and AMSAT-China.
Barry wrote, "We are very excited to see that HO-68 continues to
operate in good health and that a new member of the AMSAT Inter-
national family has established itself. Again, congratulations on
a placing HO-68 in service and best wishes for the New Year."
From India, Secretary of the Upagrah Amateur Radio Club at the
ISRO Satellite Centre, Mani, VU2WMY wrote, "Wishing XW 1 HO-68
'A Happy Birthday'. Our good wishes and greetings to HO-68 for a
very long and healthy life to serve the Ham community World wide."
Rick, K7TEJ said, "Many thanks thanks to you and Allan and the rest
of your team for your efforts to make this great bird available to
us. May HO-68 have a long life!"
From Alaska, Dale KL7XJ commented, "A very Happy Birthday to XW1,
HO-68. A very good satellite to work!"
Roland, PY4ZBZ reported good signals from HO-68 as he worked PY1AT,
PY5LF and UT1FG/MM on his sea voyage in grid FF36.
The latest HO-68 information and operating schedule can be found
on-line at:
http://www.camsat.cn/[ANS thanks BD5RV/4, WD4ASW, VU2WMY, K7TEJ, KL7XJ, and PY4ZBZ for
the above information]
/EX
SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-353.04
AMSAT-UK FUNcube Needs Help
AMSAT News Service Bulletin 353.04
From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
December 19, 2010
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-353.04
AMSAT-UK FUNcube Help needed with educational outreach
AMSAT-UK is looking for people in the educational field to help
develop the educational outreach part of the FUNcube satellite
project.
AMSAT-UK's FUNcube is an educational satellite project with the
goal of enthusing and educating young people about radio, space,
physics and electronics. Additionally it features a 435 to 145 MHz
Linear Transponder for SSB/CW operation for use outside school hours.
It will support the many existing educational Science, Technology,
Engineering and Maths (STEM) initiatives including GB4FUN.
The target audience consists of school pupils and young people gener-
ally, FUNcube will feature a 145 MHz telemetry beacon that will pro-
vide a strong signal for the pupils to receive.
A simple FUNcube dongle SDR receiver has also been developed. This
will connect to the USB port of a laptop to display telemetry and
messages in an interesting way.
The project commenced in October 2009 and it is anticipated that the
satellite will be launched before the end of 2011. More information
can be found at
http://www.funcube.org.uk/As the technical work on the satellite itself is now well underway,
AMSAT-UK is now looking to develop the educational outreach part of
the project. This will include the design and contents of the "ground
station" laptop display, the best method of providing the information
so that it relates to current curricula, and all the supporting infor-
mation that will be needed by the teachers. As they have little current
educational experience Amsat-UK need additional professional advice as
to how to carry it forward.
The FUNcube website now has details of the planned educational aspects
of the project. See
http://www.funcube.org.uk (see the "education out-
reach" link).
If you are in the educational field and have experience in curriculum
matters then please consider helping AMSAT-UK with this.
In the first instance please contact Richard G3RWL for further infor-
mation via e-mail: g3rwl at amsat.org
The latest FUNcube information can be found on-line at these pages:
FUNcube website
http://www.FUNcube.org.uk/FUNcube SDR Dongle
http://www.FUNcubeDongle.com/FUNcube Yahoo Group
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FUNcube/[ANS thanks AMSAT-UK for the above information]
/EX
SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-353.05
ARISS Status December 13, 2010
AMSAT News Service Bulletin 353.05
From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
December 19, 2010
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-353.05
Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) Status Report
December 13, 2010
1. AMSAT Covers ARISS Anniversary
The AMSAT (Radio Amateur Satellite Corporation) News Service bulletin
(ANS-346) included an article on the tenth anniversary of ARISS.
See:
http://amsat.org/pipermail/ans/2010/000468.html2. Amateur Radio Newsline Reports on ARISS
On December 10, the Amateur Radio Newsline Report 1739 ran two ARISS
news items under its heading Ham Radio in Space. Covering ten years
of contacts is the story, "ARISS Celebrates its 10th Anniversary."
"ARISSat One Enroute to Moscow" talks about the satellite on its
way to Russia for testing and launch.
See:
ftp://ftp.arnewsline.org/quincy/News/news.txt3. Astronaut Training Status
Astronaut Tom Marshburn, KE5HOC is scheduled for an ARISS introduction
class on December 13. Marshburn is slated to fly with
Expedition 34 in November 2012.
[ANS thanks Carol,KB3LKI, for the above information]
/EX
SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-353.06
Satellite Shorts
AMSAT News Service Bulletin 353.06
From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
December 19, 2010
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-353.06
Satellite Shorts From All Over
+ AMSAT's Keeper of the Keps, Ray Hoad WA5QGD advised that recent
Cubesats launched from Kodiak have been added to the AMSAT KEP
distribution:
RAX - Cat # 37223
OOREOS - Cat # 37224
FASTSAT - Cat # 37225
FAST1 and FAST2 - Cat # 37227 (FAST1 and FAST2 have the same KEPs)
For some reason, yet unknown, Spacetrack is not publishing the KEPs
for the above satellites. Special thanks to Drew Glasbrenner (KO4MA)
for helping find the location of the KEPs for the above satellites.
+ Boris, UA0QJ (Asiatic Russia) in grid PP42TA has been reported to be
active on AO7 mode B. He has been operating CW so far.
+ Listen for Duane, K5VGU operating portable on the satellites from
Kentucky grid EM67 mostly and possibly the Kentucky piece of EM68.
Duane will be in the area December 22 through December 29.
+ Listen for Daniel, VO1DZX operating portable VO2 from Labrador (FO62)
until December 31. Daniel reports that bad operating conditions and
lack of transportation will probably keep him from working any addi-
tional grids. The best time to find him will be on the late afternoon/
early evening AO51 passes as long as he can get on. Weekends will be
a good time to catch him as well.
+ Congratulations to AMSAT's Samudra N3RDX on his selection to present
a technical paper at the AIAA Aerospace Sciences Meeting in January
2011 in Orlando, Florida. His paper is: "A Broadband Multi-hop Network
for Earth-Mars Communication using Multi-purpose Interplanetary Relay
Satellites and Linear-Circular Commutating Chain Topology".
+ The next Hudson Valley Satcom Net will be on Thursday, December 23 at
8:00PM EST (UTC - 5). The net meets on the Mt. Beacon 146.970 MHZ re-
peater and also on Echolink N2EYH-L node. More information is on-line
at
http://www.hvsatcom.org.+ The December 10 edition of the UK Metro newspaper carried an article
titled 'Celebrating great British science' which featured the AMSAT-UK
FUNcube satellite. Read the article on page 25 of the Online edition
of the Metro newspaper at
http://e-edition.metro.co.uk/2010/12/10/?p=25 + Video of the spectacular night launch of the Soyuz TMA-20 spacecraft
with Expedition 26 crew members NASA astronaut Cady Coleman, Russian
cosmonaut Dmitry Kondratyev, and European Space Agency astronaut Paolo
Nespoli can be watched at:
http://tinyurl.com/2be6w6k (UniverseToday.com)
+ More images, details on SpaceX's Dragon Flight are posted on-line at:
http://tinyurl.com/34dj7gt (UniverseToday.com)
+ Northern winter is beginning in a special way. On December 21, the win-
ter solstice, a lunar eclipse will be visible across all of North
America. Full story at:
http://tinyurl.com/285grxy (nasa.gov)
[ANS thanks everyone for the above information]
/EX
SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-353.07
Thanks for your support
AMSAT News Service Bulletin 353.07
From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
December 19, 2010
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-353.07
Thank-You For Your Support - ARISSat-1 and FOX PayPal Widget Fundraising
AMSAT-NA VP Operations, Drew Glasbrenner, KO4MA noted this week that,
"We are just about to cross the $1000 mark on our PayPal fundraiser,
and along with the $710 raised from the Facebook campaign, we are
making a dent in recovering the funds spent on ARISSat-1 and those
funds that will be spent on FOX."
Drew continued, "I want to thank those that donated, and those that
took the time to add the widget to their webpages and QRZ profiles,
and especially recognize two members who have excelled in creating
exposure for our campaign. John Papay, K8YSE and Clint Bradford, K6LCS
have pulled away from the pack in the number and amount of donations
resulting from their copies of the widget, with $290 dollars raised
between them. Gentlemen, thank you!"
Beginning with the $1250 mark, we will be randomly picking a donor
from every $250 increment to receive an item from the AMSAT store.
We currently have two different hats, a nice luggage tag, or a desktop
thermometer/clock set to choose from, all bearing the AMSAT name and
logo. Drew hopes to announce our first recipient soon!
In conclusion, Drew writes, "Thanks again, and if you'd like to donate
to the campaign or share the widget to your own website, please visit
http://www.amsat.org. The widget is on the front page below the ARISSat-1
news, and you can click on "Give" to donate, or "add to site" to receive
the HTML code, or "supporters" to scroll through the statistics. I hope
to soon see more familiar names scrolling across the widget soon, showing
your support for AMSAT's next two satellites."
Donations, memberships, and store purchases may also be made through the
AMSAT store on the website, or by calling Martha at 1 888 322 6728.
[ANS thanks AMSAT-NA VP Operations, Drew Glasbrenner, KO4MA 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. Remember to track Santa bringing you all the
Happy Christmas Wishes from all the AMSAT volunteers giving their
Time so willingly.
73,
This week's ANS Editor,
Dee Interdonato, NB2F
nb2f at amsat dot org
