A new edition (v9.00) of the free IARU VHF Handbook covering the bands at VHF and Above is now available for download.
It contains all the decisions regarding the bands at VHF and Above that were made at the 2020 IARU Region 1 virtual General Conference.
The band plan on page 46 (PDF 47) covers the 145 satellite allocation and page 50 (PDF 51) shows the changes to 436-438 MHz.
Download the free PDF at
https://www.iaru-r1.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/VHF_Handbook_V9.00.pdf
During November 26-28 HS0AJ/P will be active on QO-100 and the other amateur radio satellites from Grid Square NK99 in Thailand
A post on the AMSAT Bulletin Board says:
The Thailand’s Amateur Radio Satellite group (AMSAT-HS) has requested permission to establish a temporary station (DX portable) with the northern office of the NBTC, Thailand’s regulator, in Chiang Mai and Mae Hong Son (grid NK99) provinces in the north of Thailand during the period from November 26-28, 2020 to communicate via All LEO and MEO amateur radio satellites (including QO-100 NB) that pass over Thailand using the callsign HS0AJ/P of the Radio Amateur Society of Thailand under the Royal Patronage of His Majesty the King.
Hence we would like to notify all radio amateurs who would [be] interested in contacting stations in Thailand on its northern border of this activity. Even if the angle is as low as 0 degrees please try to contact us. We hope to meet you on all satellites frequency then.
Operator by:
E21EJC KoB
HS1JAN NaN
73 All de Kob E21EJC and Tanan HS1JAN
Source AMSAT-BB https://www.amsat.org/pipermail/amsat-bb/2020-November/080313.html
QO-100 information https://amsat-uk.org/satellites/geo/eshail-2/
International Space Station – Image Credit NASA
On November 13, 2000, the ISS Expedition-1 crew turned on the ARISS Ericsson radio for the first time and completed several contacts with ARISS ground stations around the world to validate the radio communications system.
These inaugural contacts launched an incredible two-decade operations journey on ISS, enabling ARISS to inspire, engage and educate our next generation of explorers and provide the ham radio community a platform for lifelong learning and experimentation.
In celebration of the ISS 20th anniversary, ARISS was part of an ISS Research and Development Conference Panel session entitled “20 years of STEM Experiments on the ISS.” The video below, developed for this panel session, describes our program, celebrates our 20th anniversary, conveys some key lessons learned over the past 20 years and describes the ARISS team’s vision for the future. Enjoy watching!
20 years of continuous operations is a phenomenal accomplishment. But what makes it even more extraordinary is that ARISS has achieved this through hundreds of volunteers that are passionate in “paying it forward” to our youth and ham radio community. On behalf of the ARISS International team, I would like to express our heartfelt thanks to every volunteer that has made ARISS such an amazing success over the past 20 years. Your passion, drive, creativity and spirit made it happen!!
Congratulations ARISS team!!!
Frank H. Bauer, KA3HDO
ARISS International Chair
Watch ARISS 20th Anniversary
Source ARISS https://www.ariss.org/
AREx – Gateway Amateur Radio Exploration
On Tuesday, November 10, Dave Johnson G4DPZ gave an online satellite talk to the Mid Ulster Amateur Radio Club, the video is now available for everyone to watch on YouTube.
The talk covered the many amateur satellites in Low Earth Orbit that operate in the 145.8-146.0 MHz and 435-438 MHz satellite bands as well as the QO-100 geostationary satellite which uses the 2.4 GHz and 10 GHz bands.
Also covered were the new Inter-Operable Radio System which has recently been installed in the ISS Columbus module and Gateway Amateur Radio Exploration (AREx).
After the talk the Mid Ulster ARC @MN0VFW tweeted:
“What a talk from Dave G4DPZ from @AmsatUK this evening. Thank you to him and everyone who joined in.”
https://twitter.com/MN0VFW/status/1326284522388905985
Watch AMSAT-UK and Amateur radio satellites with Dave G4DPZ
Mid Ulster Amateur Radio Club (MUARC) talks are held online at Zoom Meeting ID 832 6862 3068 at 7pm on the 2nd and 4th Tuesday’s of each month
https://twitter.com/MN0VFW/status/1326114389804584963
You can watch previous MUARC talks at https://www.youtube.com/MuarcMedia/videos
Some of the EIRSAT-1 Team
The EIRSAT-1 CubeSat, built by students at University College Dublin, is due for launch on the Vega rocket in early 2021 and you can help!
The South Dublin Radio Club was honored to host a talk by David Murphy EI9HWB and Fergal Marshall of the EIRSAT-1 team. In this video, they give a comprehensive technical run-through of the satellite’s payload, subsystems and onboard communications.
From an amateur radio and hobbyist point-of-view, there is a full run-through of the uplink and downlink schemes including detailed flow charts (including demodulation and decoding). For details go to 14:30
This followed by a detailed proposal as to how amateur radio operators can contribute to ground station operations via SatNOGs and gr_satellites GNU Radio. For details go to 34:05
EIRSAT-1 particularly wants help with signal acquisition just after launch… the riskiest part of the mission. They want help from amateur radio operators, listeners, scanners, makers, etc… to expand the mission’s ground segment. For details go to 39:50
There is then a very informative Q&A.
Watch You can help Ireland’s first satellite, EIRSAT-1!
EIRSAT-1 – 437.100 MHz
https://www.eirsat1.ie/
https://twitter.com/eirsat1
South Dublin Radio Club https://twitter.com/SDRadioClub
The AMSAT News Service (ANS) reports that at its open meeting on September 30, 2020, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) adopted a Report and Order that sunsets Amateur use of the 3.3-3.5 GHz band.
This spectrum includes the 3.40-3.41 GHz Amateur-Satellite Service allocation. AMSAT had previously filed comments opposing the FCC’s proposal to delete this spectrum.
The adopted FCC Report and Order can be found at
https://www.fcc.gov/document/fcc-seeks-facilitate-5g-345-355-ghz-band-0
AMSAT-UK 
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