Postcards from space

Posted: Thursday, October 23, 2008 10:00 AM by Alan Boyle

R. Garriott via ARISS / MAREX

An image sent via
amateur radio shows a
Soyuz craft in space.

More than 2,000 electronic postcards have been received from the international space station during video-game millionaire Richard Garriott's weeklong visit - thanks to extraterrestrial messaging systems that were built by amateurs, for amateurs (and astronauts).

The SpaceCam1 and VC-H1 systems - developed by the MAREX ham-radio group and Amateur Radio on the International Space Station - use the space station's amateur-radio rig to scan and send TV-like images back down to Earth. They follow up on slow-scan TV experiments that go back to Russia's Mir space station, and even earlier.

When you think of ham radio, you usually think of someone hunched over a microphone, sending their voice around the world. And that still plays a big role in the work carried on by Amateur Radio on the International Space Station, also known as ARISS. Sure, astronauts have high-tech videoconferencing tools and even Internet linkups nowadays, but ham radio provides an extra backup channel as well as a recreational means to interact with hobbyists and schoolchildren.

Ham radio can also be used to send data, and that's where the slow-scan TV experiments come in.

Here's an e-mail message from MAREX's Miles Mann about SpaceCam1's latest success:

"I have an unusual hobby. I build educational projects for the Russian space program. So far, the Russians have let me build and fly four different projects in space. Three projects went onto the Russian space station Mir, and my latest project is on the international space station. The new project is called SpaceCam1.

"The project is simple. Send JPG images from the international space station to Earth via amateur radio. Use a common amateur radio frequency and let everyone see the images using free decoding software. The project worked!

"Last weekend, on October 12, ISS commander Sergei Volkov activated my project and began sending images down to Earth. The next day, when Richard Garriott arrived on ISS, he began using the SpaceCam1 and related SSTV hardware to send images down to Earth. We have received over 1500 JPG images from ISS in 1 week.

"What makes this interesting [is that] it was designed and built by a handful of volunteer amateur-radio operators and then delivered to Russia to be used on ISS.

"Today, thousands of shortwave-listeners and amateur-radio stations around the world are seeing live JPG images coming down from ISS.

"Richard Garriott has also been using the amateur-radio station on ISS to talk to people all around the world."

The MAREX-MG Web site offers a selection of images sent from the international space station..

ARISS International Chairman Frank Bauer provided the latest information on his group's project, the VC-H1 Visual Communicator. He said the use of SpaceCam1 has been limited because it "has some issues with it that keeps the radio transmitting when no image is being downlinked":

"That is why the ARISS team worked with Richard Garriott to fly the VC-H1 and we got it certified for flight in record speed. Another item that changes history a bit is that the first experimentation of SSTV in space did not occur on Mir a decade ago. It occurred in July 1985 (two decades ago) on the STS-51F space shuttle mission by Tony England, W0ORE. Tony, the second ham radio operator in space, was a good friend and colleague of Owen Garriott, Richard Garriott's father. And the SSTV system flew on the shuttle several missions in the early 1990s and was very popular. Actually, on one flight the morning newspaper was uplinked to the crew via SSTV!

"To date, we have received over 2,000 images from ham radio operators around the world that have captured the SSTV downlinks from ISS and posted them to the ARISS SSTV Gallery. And we have a volunteer team that has been working 24/7 during Richard's flight to sort these images and provide the 'best of the best.' These can be seen on http://ariss-sstv.ssl.berkeley.edu/SSTV/ ...

"Also, the ARISS team has provided an SSTV blog. ... This site has lots of information on the SSTV operations, particularly during Richard's flight. And we will continue to update it when Mike Fincke uses the SSTV system."

To keep posted on Garriott's trip back to Earth, which is scheduled to take place Thursday night, keep a watch on our space news section.

I'm in the midst of a trip myself - a trek that includes stopovers at the Fermilab particle-physics facility in Illinois and at Stanford University in California for the CASW New Horizons in Science seminar. I'll also be spending a little personal time in Iowa.

Over the next week, postings to the log will be dependent on time, bandwidth and news developments. Don't be surprised if I send a postcard myself every once in a while - if not from the space frontier, then at least from the science frontier.

This posting was originally published on Oct. 21, and has been corrected and updated to reflect additional information from Frank Bauer about ARISS' work in slow-scan TV.

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Comments

I learned to love astronomy by watching Carl Sagan's Cosmos series. A year or so ago I purchased the undated DVD version of the series and absolutely fell in love again. I lent the first disc to a co-worker and never got it back. Does anyone know if it is possible to get a copy of Disc 1 or would anyone be willing to make me a copy? I'd gladly reimburse him or her for the cost of the DVD and mailing.

[ALAN ADDS: I can't encourage DVD piracy here, but perhaps someone can point Tom to eBay listings or other sources for a partial set.]

Tom Smith, Allentown, PA (Sent Tuesday, October 21, 2008 7:53 PM)

So cool how amateur inventors can make very useful things that can benefit all of us. The ISS is very special and should be supported by all. I can't wait for the next shuttle mission that will help improve the ISS's capabilities.

Eric, Salinas, CA (Sent Wednesday, October 22, 2008 10:27 AM)

Hi Tom Smith

I don't have any of the DVDs, but you can probably find them on ebay. But although the DVDs are great, do you have the book? I would highly recomend the book as well. It is what got me hooked into astronomy and it was "hook, line, and sinker" as Carl Sagan himself would put it, as I am now on my way to getting a Ph.D. in astronomy. Whenever I have a rough day when things on my research are just not working out I open Cosmos to its very first paragraph:
"The Cosmos is all that is or ever was or ever will be. Our feeblest contemplations of the Cosmos stir us -- there is a tingling in the spine, a catch in the voice, a faint sensations, as if a distant memory, of falling from a height. We know we are approaching the greatest of mysteries."

Although I did not know this when I started, Carl Sagan was the undertgraduate advisor of my current thesis advisor (Him at Cornell, me at Georgia State), and you can just tell when a person was touched by Segan's spirit. There is just a different way of seeing things, a different enthusiasm that is hard to describe.

Serge
dieterich@chara.gsu.edu

Serge, Atlanta, GA (Sent Wednesday, October 22, 2008 11:13 AM)

Ham radio is a great hobby. It's been a real treat to hear Richard call so frequently from the ISS because usually the astronauts are very busy and only have a little bit of recreation time to make contacts. So making voice contact with any astronaut in space is quite a special occasion.

This morning at 6 AM I was one of the lucky ones who Richard heard. He responded that I was "five nine" meaning in ham speak "loud and clear" before moving on to the next ham. This was during a period lasting less than 10 minutes while the ISS passed over Florida and northeast across the western Atlantic. It was still dark in Virginia but the sun struck the ISS and I watched it drift across the early morning sky like a slowly moving star.

At 7:35 AM I let my son try to reach Richard and after a few calls, Richard called him back and completed the exchange. He is seven and in second grade, and boy was he thrilled. All this with nothing more than a 50 watt ham radio in a Volvo using a handheld antenna made from a tape measure and PVC pipe. My wife has been emailing a recording of this "QSO" to all of our family and friends.

When you listen to Richard calling down to us, you can tell he makes an extra effort trying to pick the smaller voices out of the crowd. You can hear his voice rise in excitement and encouragement when he is able to make the contact. His grandfather was a ham, his father was a ham and a Skylab astronaut, and it is obvious he wants to pass along this tradition and spark that same curiosity in space and science in the youth he reaches.

We are very fortunate to have had Richard spend so much of his time in space reaching back to Earth and touching so many of us.

Sean, Leesburg, VA (Sent Wednesday, October 22, 2008 1:16 PM)

I would like thanks to all of the volunteers and organizations around the world that assisted MarexMG with getting the SpaceCam1 project running from the International Space Station.

Special thanks to:
The ARISS team for getting all of the flight safety approvals from several space agencies.
The ARISS hardware team for resolving the complex (ISS) power and data infrastructure requirements.
The Silicon Pixels Company for developing the SpaceCam1 software.
The NASA and the Russian Federal Space Agency for letting the amateur radio community conduct this new series of educational experiments.
The Intuit Corporation for implementing the "We Care & Give Back" program.
The Vendors, for providing hardware and technical expertise, Kenwood Corporation, Icom, David Clark and DCI.ca
And of course my family for letting me indulge in my Hobby.

I believe educational projects of this type, on ISS, will help generate interest in cosmic exploration. And they are fun for the crew too.

73 Miles WF1F, Manned Amateur Radio eXperiment MG (MAREXMG)
Wf1f@issspacecam.org

Miles Mann Chelmsford Mass (Sent Wednesday, October 22, 2008 1:54 PM)

Back in the '50's, I was inspired to "LOOK TO THE SKIES!" by early Science Fiction writers & the B & W Sci-Fi Movie "Saturday Matinees" for kids; by the DISNEY series about "THE SUN" & "Mr. Wizard"; early "POPULAR MECHANICS" magazines -- I have one from 1957 & these old issues are fascinating to look at, even now. I loved the SKYSHOW at Chicago's ADLER PLANETARIUM when in H.S.-- was absolutely disgusted when Sen. John McCain chose to "throw SCIENCE and apparently PLANETARIUMS under the Bus, recently!

My "Theory of Education" is that every Student from Elementary thru High School should have as part of the School's CORE Curriculum -- age appropriate SCIENCE FICTION books, art, pop culture, and for 4th Grade up, Movies -- for nothing else so OPENS the Mind, Excites & Inspires the Imagination, leads to "FUTURISTIC" thinking & "OUT of the BOX"thinking!

And, after 8 years of an Anti-Science "LUDDITE" regime in the White House, God knows we need more FUTURISTS & "Out of the Box" thinkers-- to remind our Children and Ourselves to WATCH THE SKIES!

There's still a part of every Baby Boomer who watched "INVADERS FROM MARS" that looks to the STARS, because that's where the ALIENS will be coming from, to put "THE MARK" on the backs of our Parent's NECKS!

Imagination of our KIDS-- will be what takes us to the STARS in the future. I don't know Video Game Millionaire Richard Garrett, but I betcha' he read SCIENCE FICTION as a child!

Linda , Kevil, KY (Sent Thursday, October 23, 2008 4:18 AM)

If we can continue to have people dabble in the sciences and do things on their own, improvements might be found by the most unlikely people. I hope that this continues.

S.B. Stein E.B. NJ (Sent Thursday, October 23, 2008 3:00 PM)

In one of the latter episodes of Cosmos Dr. Sagan spoke of a hypothetical inter galactic conference of intelligent species in the Milky Way & he asked the question "who speaks for earth?? Of all the people that I have learned about (living or dead) Dr Carl Sagan spoke for earth more pasionately, eloquently & correctly than anyone. I am afraid that He was our last best hope

arnold, st.louis,mo (Sent Thursday, October 23, 2008 3:53 PM)

Carl Sagan was an inspiration for the '70s and the early '80's until personal computing took over.

Carl Sagan was like J.Bronowski who equally was awesome Think Mars at the end of the vid...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2p9By0qXms&feature=related

Thomas Ashby, Calgary (Sent Friday, October 24, 2008 3:39 AM)

An interesting question is whether or not Sagan would be able to do what he did in the 70's and 80's today. Would he be drowned by the 150+ channels in cable TV? Would our ever shortening attention span allow him enough time to develop his ideas? I think there are always those who are willing to listen and pay attention, but the overall popularizing of astronomy he did would probably reach a lesser segment of the population today. That is why higher thinking in high and middle school curricula is so important. School is the one place we still have the opportunity to capture the imagination of the overall population, but it needs to be done right and it is not an easy job.

dieterich@chara.gsu.edu

Serge, Atlanta, GA (Sent Friday, October 24, 2008 10:07 AM)

I love the ISS but do any of you know NASA intends to take it down much sooner than its planned demise? I thought it was to stay up until 2050 but I hear it could be 2020 or sooner. What a waste.

Dr. Karl Kolb Ph.D. (Sent Friday, October 24, 2008 5:34 PM)

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