Preliminary Results of the Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) meeting at NASA Goddard 5-7 Dec 2002 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ WB4APR EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: It appears we have gotten approval from ARISS to proceed with PCsat2 (though we won't know the exact wording or limitations (if any) until the formal minutes. We also made many other contributions to the ARISS committee meeting and future project concepts. Because PCsat pushes the envelope of the Amateur Satellite Service on the International Space Station, we were tasked with developing a draft freuency planning doecument for the future of all applications within the ARISS perview. DETAILS: The PCsat2 Project Opportunity was presented to the ARISS delegates at the semi-annual meeting held this year at NASA Goddard. The 4 day meeting opened with the chairman noting some of the challenges in the coming year and one of the topics mentioned was the potential for external ISS experiments that may want to use the Amateur Satellite Service while pushing the envelope of what may or may not be appropriate for that service. While this comment was intended only as a summary comment, the ensuing animated discussion made it obvious that this was a tough issue and it was soon clear that the Naval Academy presentation scheduled for Friday would be the focal point of this topic. By the time Friday came, the agenda was a half day behind and so the PCsat2 presentation was moved to Saturday morning to assure adequate time to discuss this important issue. To summarize the presentation, the hot issues of pecuniary interest, proprietary data, and DOD involvement immediately pushed many buttons and much comment was generated before even the first few slides could be presented. PCSAT2 PRESENTATION: But after the initial response, and as the presentation was able to proceed as planned, voiced concerns faded and by the end of the presentation, there seemed to be a general feeling of guarded optimism with only a few delegates reserving judgment until they had time to digest the material. We closed with the comment that what we needed from ARISS was an endorsement of the concept and that we also needed from AMSAT a statement in principle that the PCsat mission as presented was in fact fully within the rules and intent of the International rules for the Amateur Satellite Service. PCsat2 RESULTS: The Committee agreed to meet in closed session after the formal agenda but before any of the primary delegates left the USA. As of this writing, I have heard that the results were "good news" though it may be a day or so before I have any details. CONCLUSION: I think the way we organized the PCsat2/MISSE5 experiment and prepared the communications design to fit within a fully compliant niche in the ITU rules was the key to the success of this approach, and in fact, could pave the way for many follow-on missions to the ISS using the MISSE experiment container. FUTURE ARISS COORDINATION: Further, although there was quite a range in the delegations betwen technical and non technical members, I am pleased with the personal raport we developed with the key Russian delegate who was very interested in the techincal details and compatibility. He also seemed to share my vision for the future of many of the other experiments planned and proposed for ARISS. ARISS FREQUENCY PLANNING: We came away tasked with the job of working up a frequency planning document for all future ARISS missions, since PCsat2 will be the first excursion beyond the very hard won international frequencies determined back in the l997 time frame. Fortunately the global reach of APRS back then had placed us in the key position of vacating a single APRS frequency yielding an otherwise unavailable frequency for ISS. This compromise lead to a global uncontested frequency for ARISS and North American clear channel for APRS. Further it established the seeds of cooperation between the two interests that serve us both well. HF CONCEPT OF OPERATIONS: Further, seeing the Russian plans for adding HF frequencies and equipment to ARISS in 2003, we propsed a concept of operations that had not previously been considered. This concept of operations offers an order of magnitude better communications between the crew and schools on the ground by operating in full duplex, allowing the schools to observe ,if not directly participate, in any other school contacts, not just their own. FULL DUPLEX SCHOOL COMMUNICATIONS SYSTEM: A final contribution we made to the meeting was the observation that the long awaited full duplex communications system for school contacts did not have to wait until the future Phase2 hardware, but that there was sufficient transmitters and receivers on board right now to accompliesh this mission with the only missing ingredient being a simple audio cable. We proposed an effort to send up the audio cable on a Russian resupply mission soon, instead of waiting for the full phase two. ALso, by having the audio cable, then the old phase 1 simplex Erricsson radios did not have to be abandoned when phase 2 hardware was eventually activated in the USA Habitability module but that it could continue to operate as a second system in the FGB for the Russian segment for several more years. ASTRONAUT-SCHOOL CONACT BACKLOG: THe ARISS Operations committee reported that the current school backlog for Astronaut to school communications was on the order of 2 years and growing longer. But with PCsat-2, I was able to point out that the School-to-astronaut backlog could be improved by an order of magnitude by using the full duplex transponder on PCsat2. to simply link school events to Astronauts at JSC "via" ISS instead of having to schedule and use up the very valuable time of the Astronatuts in space. To the school and the students, the geometry, and communications would be the same, but it could be done on many orbits, not just one every week or so because it used a larger pool of astronauts on the ground. THe meeting was a very rewarding event. Bob Bruninga USNA Satellite Lab 410-293-6417