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FCC rejects AMSAT Orbital Debris Petition

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FCC rejects AMSAT Orbital Debris Petition

FCC SealARRL reports the FCC has rejected a Petition for Reconsideration that AMSAT filed 14 years ago, seeking to exempt Amateur Radio satellites from the FCC’s satellite orbital debris mitigation requirements.

The ARRL story says:

The Commission took the opportunity in a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking and Order on Reconsideration, released on November 19, that revisits its orbital debris rules for the first time since their adoption in 2004. Among other things, AMSAT had argued at the time of its Petition that applying the orbital debris requirements to Amateur Radio satellites would be cost prohibitive, and that the FCC had not indicated what constitutes an acceptable orbital debris mitigation plan.

Acknowledging that time has made some of AMSAT’s arguments moot, the FCC said the costs involved with modifications to comply with post-mission disposal requirements “are justified when balanced against the public interest in mitigating orbital debris.” The FCC said it determined that closer adherence to the disposal methods described in the rules was “warranted in order to limit the growth of orbital debris” in low-Earth orbit (LEO).

“In any event, in the years since the debris mitigation rules were adopted, and notwithstanding any costs imposed by FCC regulations, well over 150 small satellites have been authorized, with at least 20 of those considered amateur satellites,” the FCC said in its November 15 Order on Reconsideration. “It appears that, to the extent that any costs have been incurred, the main contributor to costs for amateur and similar LEO missions has to do with the availability of launches to appropriate orbits.”

The FCC also said that in the years since the FCC issued its Orbital Debris Order, “numerous licensees, including amateur satellites operating in LEO, have successfully satisfied our orbital debris mitigation requirements.

FCC Notice of Proposed Rulemaking and Order on Reconsideration
https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/FCC-18-159A1.pdf

2004 AMSAT Petition for Reconsideration
https://ecfsapi.fcc.gov/file/6516493220.pdf

2004 FCC Second Report and Order IB Docket No. 02-54
https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/FCC-04-130A1.pdf

Source ARRL http://www.arrl.org/news/fcc-rejects-2004-amsat-petition-to-reconsider-applying-orbital-debris-rules-to-ham-satellites

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m5aka

AMSAT-UK

NASA Highlights Science on Next Resupply Mission to International Space Station

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NASA Highlights Science on Next Resupply Mission to International Space Station

NASA will host a media teleconference at 1 p.m. EST Wednesday, Nov. 28, to discuss select science investigations launching on the next SpaceX commercial resupply flight to the International Space Station.

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NASA Breaking News

Three Humans Will Spend Thanksgiving 260 Miles Above Earth

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Three Humans Will Spend Thanksgiving 260 Miles Above Earth

Expedition 57 crew selfie
Serena Auñón-Chancellor (right) takes a group selfie with her Expedition 57 crew mates (from left) Sergey Prokopyev and Alexander Gerst. The three-person crew was gathered for dinner in the Zvezda Service Module, part of the International Space Station’s Russian segment.

Three humans will spend Thanksgiving orbiting about 260 miles above Earth. Another three individuals are spending the holiday in Kazakhstan preparing to launch to the International Space Station on Dec. 3.

The Expedition 57 trio from the U.S., Russia and Germany will share a traditional Thanksgiving meal together with fresh ingredients delivered over the weekend on a pair of new cargo ships. Commander Alexander Gerst from ESA (European Space Agency) and NASA Flight Engineer Serena Auñón-Chancellor will take the day off in space. Cosmonaut Sergey Prokopyev will work a normal day of Russian science and maintenance then join his crewmates for the holiday feast.

Gerst called down to European mission controllers today for a weekly tag up then answered a questionnaire about his experiences living in space. Afterward, he continued unpacking inventory from the new Cygnus cargo craft.

Auñón-Chancellor spent most of her day in Japan’s Kibo lab module working on life support gear. Toward the end of the day, she stowed research samples in a science freezer then debriefed ground controllers with Gerst about Cygnus cargo operations.

Prokopyev focused his attention on the Russian side of the orbital lab working on life support gear and unloading the new Progress 71 cargo craft.

Back on Earth, three Expedition 58 crew members from the U.S., Russia and Canada are in final training ahead of their six-and-a-half month mission on the orbital lab. Cosmonaut Oleg Kononenko will lead the six-hour flight aboard the Soyuz MS-11 spacecraft flanked by NASA astronaut Anne McClain and Canadian Space Agency astronaut David Saint-Jacques.

This will be Kononenko’s fourth mission to the space station and his second as station commander. McClain and Saint-Jacques are both beginning their first missions to space.

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Mark Garcia
{authorlink}
ISS

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Happy 5th Birthday FUNcube-1

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Happy 5th Birthday FUNcube-1

First signals received from FUNcube-1

First signals received from FUNcube-1

Five years ago, on November 21, 2013, FUNcube-1 launched into space. Soon, we hope to welcome ESEO (FUNcube-4) and JY1SAT (FUNcube-6) into space. A remarkable achievement by the radio amateur volunteers of AMSAT-UK and AMSAT-NL.

Happy Birthday FUNcube-1.

In 2010, we got the first prototypes working and got zero packet errors when testing the downlink chain!

In 2012, we were assembling the flight model in the ISISpace clean room. ISISpace has been the satellite integrator for this mission and continues to partner with AMSAT-UK on multiple missions.

Another big milestone straight after assembly of the spacecraft: the antenna deployment test! During this test, we pretend the satellite is in space for the first time, and check that it successfully starts up and starts transmitting to the world.

After the deployment testing, the antennas need to be stowed again, and then we arm the satellite for launch and place it in its deployment canister together with our fellow passengers HiNCube and ZACUBE-1. In this case the ISISpace ISIPOD was used.

Next up: transport to the launch base, fitting to the rocket, and LAUNCH! FUNcube was launched 21 November 2013 at 07:10 UTC on a Dnepr rocket from Yasny Launch Base. Thanks ISILaunch for taking us up on ISILaunch03.

Since then, we have had FUNcube systems in UKube-1, QB50p1, Nayif-1 and the upcoming ESEO and JY1SAT spacecraft, bringing the total FUNcube payloads launched for STEM education and amateur radio to six.

In 5 years, FUNcube has transmitted for 157,766,400 seconds, with a 256kB frame every 5 seconds, equating to approx 7.5GB of data. Our ground network has recovered 1.7GB. On average, we see 105 daily listeners, receiving 3688 frames per day. At minimum, we still had 40 listeners.

Users receiving FUNcube-1 telemetry and uploading to Data Warehouse

Users receiving FUNcube-1 telemetry and uploading to Data Warehouse

We were very conservative with our power budget. The battery is almost always full, and quickly charges up after eclipse. The solar panel current Ipv does not show significant degradation. the ISI Space solar panels and GOMspace EPS are doing a wonderful job.

FUNcube-1 Solar Flux versus Power Generation

FUNcube-1 Solar Flux versus Power Generation

On board temperatures have been at maximum 43.2°C, and at minimum -26.7°C, disregarding some outliers caused by the satellite rebooting. We have had two periods of continuous illumination, which can be seen by the temperature rises.

FUNcube-1 Temperature

FUNcube-1 Temperature

Wouter Weggelaar PA3WEG

FUNcube-1 (AO-73) information https://amsat-uk.org/satellites/communications/funcube-1/

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m5aka

AMSAT-UK

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ESEO launch information and Dashboard

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ESEO launch information and Dashboard

ESEO in anechoic chamber at ESTEC with Jonas Holtstiege and Pete Bartram

ESEO in anechoic chamber at ESTEC with Jonas Holtstiege and Pete Bartram

The launch of the ESEO spacecraft has now been confirmed to be on board the SSO-A flight from Vandenberg.

The ESEO microsatellite includes a FUNcube payload which will provide similar telemetry to its predecessors but will have a more powerful transmitter and thus be even easier to hear. For amateurs, this payload will also provide a single channel L/V transponder for FM. These downlinks will be transmitted on 145.895 MHz and the FM transponder uplink will be on 1263.5 MHz with a 67Hz PLL tone required.

A new Dashboard has been developed for this mission and a finalised pre-launch version will available for download within the next few days. In the meantime here is the AMSAT FUNcube Payload Downlink Data document. This gives all the information required to decode the telemetry ESEO_Downlink_Data_1_21a

The new Dashboard will operate in exactly the same manner as those developed for previous missions and general set-up information can be downloaded here: Dashboard Guidance

A new Data Warehouse has also been created. This can be used to view the telemetry from ALL of the FUNcube missions: http://data2.amsat-uk.org/

We expect that the FUNcube telemetry transmitter will become operational after the launch and subsequent to the completion of initial de-tumbling of the spacecraft.

Thanks for your valuable support for this mission!

More information on ESEO is available from ESA Education’s website
https://www.esa.int/Education/ESEO

Information on other SSO-A spacecraft with amateur radio payloads
https://amsat-uk.org/2018/11/14/ssoa-amateur-radio-satellites/

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m5aka

AMSAT-UK

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