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WG3K > ANS 18.02.24 02:00z 57 Lines 3573 Bytes #999 (0) @ AMSAT
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Subj: Satellite Shorts From All Over
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Sent: 240218/0145Z 1036@WG3K.#SMD.MD.USA.NOAM LinBPQ6.0.24
Satellite Shorts From All Over
The JAMSAT Annual General Meeting and Symposium 2024 will be held in
Sagano, Kyoto on 23-24 March 2024. To join the Symposium by ZOOM, please
send e-mail to Ueda-san, ja0fkm@gmail.com, with your Callsign and Name by
16 March. He will send you invitation email including Zoom URL. If you are
adept at reading Japanese (or have a good translation program) the latest
edition of the JAMSAT Newsletter is packed with excellent articles,
including a full report of satellite operations by the JAMSAT VK9QO
DXpedition to Cocos (Keeling) Island, amateur transmissions from the moon
by the SLIM LEV-1/LEV-2 landers, and a how-to on restoring a Yaesu G-5500
rotator. Visit the JAMSAT website at https://www.jamsat.or.jp/ to learn
more. (ANS thanks Mikio Mouri, JA3GEP, JAMSAT Newsletter Editor, for the
above information.)
An unspecified defect in early model Starlink satellites has prompted
SpaceX to preemptively deorbit the units before they potentially fail and
become hazards in low Earth orbit. The company has already initiated the
disposal of 406 units from the nearly 6,000 satellites launched to date.
Among these, 17 are currently non-maneuverable but are expected to
naturally decay and eventually burn up in Earths atmosphere in the coming
years. However, the decision to deorbit a large batch of approximately 100
satellites within a brief amount of time is certainly out of the ordinary.
(ANS thanks Gismodo for the above information.)
The European Space Agencys Cluster mission, which has spent 24 years
revealing the secrets of Earths magnetic environment, is coming to an end.
The first of the four satellites in the Cluster quartet, named ‘Salsa,
will reenter Earths atmosphere in September 2024. This month, spacecraft
operators carried out a series of manoeuvres to ensure this reentry will
take place over a sparsely populated region in the South Pacific. The end
of the Cluster mission offers a rare chance to study the safe atmospheric
reentry of four identical satellites under different conditions. (ANS
thanks The European Space Agency for the above information.)
Copernicus, the Earth observation component of the European Unions Space
programme, has confirmed that January 2024 was the warmest January on
record. Samantha Burgess, Deputy Director of the Copernicus Climate Change
Service (C3S) said: “2024 starts with another record-breaking month – not
only is it the warmest January on record but we have also just experienced
a 12-month period [with a mean global average temperature] more than 1.5°C
above the pre-industrial reference period. Rapid reductions in greenhouse
gas emissions are the only way to stop global temperatures increasing.”
(ANS thanks https://climate.copernicus.eu for the above information.)
Voyager 1, humanitys most distant scientific outpost, is currently
careening away from Earth at 17 kilometers every second and unable to
transmit useful scientific or engineering data back to us across nearly a
light-day of space. The problem with the 46-year-old spacecraft cropped up
back in November, when Voyager started sending gibberish back to Earth.
Flight controllers have determined that the problem lies within the one
remaining flight data system (FDS) computer on board, most likely thanks to
a single bit of corrupted memory. The team has tried rebooting the FDS, to
no avail. With most of the engineers who originally built the spacecraft
long gone now, the team is treading very carefully. (ANS thanks Hackaday
for the above information.)
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