ISS activities

[Sean Sheedy]

Thanks, Iain, that was a cool report!

I was able to exchange callsigns with Richard around 5:58 AM Wednesday  
morning.  He gave me a 59.  I was on top of a parking structure in  
Reston Towne Center with a 50 watt FT-10R and a 3 element tape  
measurement yagi.  It helped that I could see the satellite traveling  
through the still dark sky.

On the next pass I had my son in the car at his school and at 7:35 AM  
or so Richard pulled his voice out of the pileup and completed the  
contact which I was fortunately able to capture both sides of on the  
PC at home.

The mission plans for Thursday showed that the radio was supposed to  
be turned off at 9:30 AM EDT in preparation for the landing and I  
picked up half of an SSTV transmission from the car as it was  
descending.  I was surprised to get home and find recordings of  
Richard squeaking in as many contacts as he could in two passes in the  
afternoon!

You could tell Richard really dug talking to the kids.  He worked  
extra hard to make sure they got in and the excitement in his voice  
rose every time.  You can tell that amateur radio and space permeated  
his youth and he wanted to reach out and share it - it was really a  
nice experience copying him and making contact.

Sean AI4ID

On Oct 24, 2008, at 10:37 AM, Iain McFadyen wrote:

> Don't know if any AMRAD members were listening in on the recent ISS  
> SSTV activity?
>
> I've been leaving one side of my mobile rig tuned to 145.800  
> listening (but not decoding) the SSTV downlinks.
>
> Then, on Thursday, at 18:50 UTC, whilst driving from Morant Point to  
> Kingston, I heard voice on 145.800!
>
> Managed to have a brief but nice conversation with Richard Garriott  
> on the ISS. I was using the Club callsign, 6Y5RA (so much easier to  
> say than "KI4HLV portable 6Y5"). Downlink signals were superb!
>
> I listened while Richard had abother quick QSO with an 8P6, and then  
> announced "this is my last transmission from the ISS". He must then  
> have hustled into the Soyuz and started the journey back to earth  
> almost immediately, because he landed at 03:30UTC today.
>
> The SSTV downlink was a novelty to me, but there are several  
> websites showing spectacular downlink pix in the last few weeks.
>
> Iain   KI4HLV/6Y5     Kingston Jamaica.
>
>
>
>
>
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Sean Sheedy
sean at theSheedys.com
home: 703-777-9009
work: 703-898-0201

39392 Crooked Bridge Lane
Leesburg, VA 20175

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