INTERNATIONAL AMATEUR RADIO UNION

SUMMARY RECORD OF THE
IARU INTERNATIONAL
AMATEUR RADIO SATELLITE FORUM
HELD IN
SAN DIEGO, 8 OCTOBER 1999

WELCOMING

Ray Soifer, W2RS, welcomed all the delegates present and thanked AMSAT-NA for hosting this year's IARU International Amateur Radio Satellite Forum. He explained that the forum is held alternately in conjunction with the AMSAT-NA Space Symposium and the AMSAT-UK Colloquium.

REPORT FROM THE IARU SATELLITE ADVISOR:

HANS VAN DE GROENENDAAL, ZS5AKV, reviewed the major activity over the past year:

INFORMATION DOCUMENT

He tabled the IARU Document: "Information for prospective owners and operators of satellites utilising frequencies allocated to the amateur-satellite service". The IARU Administrative Council recently adopted the document. The guide was originally prepared by AMSAT-NA, and accepted by both the Toronto and Surrey Forums. Thanks were expressed to Dave Sumner for the final editing and corrections to the references in the ITU radio regulations.

The document is available on the IARU web site at: http://www.iaru.org/satellite/

National societies and AMSAT groups are requested to distribute the document to universities and other institutions as appropriate.

MONITORING SATELLITE FREQUENCIES

The pilot project to monitor intruders on the amateur-satellite service bands did not receive the desired support in Region 1. It was agreed not to pursue the project. The following recommendations were accepted:

Where satellite operators monitor intruders in the amateur-satellite service bands, they should note the following information: date, time, downlink frequency, satellite, call sign and location of the interfering station (if known), text or a recording of the interference received, and any other information to help prove the interference, identity, and location of the interfering station. Operators are requested to communicate this information to their national amateur radio society which will, in turn, lodge a complaint with their country's regulatory authority. This process provides the regulatory authority with adequate information to pass on to the administration responsible for the interfering station in accordance with the procedure for resolving interference complaints specified in the radio regulations.

IARU WEBSITE

In future, all documents related to International Amateur Satellite matters will be filed on the IARU web site at http://www.iaru.org . AMSAT organisations with websites are requested to link to IARU.

REPORT BY THE IARU AMSAT FREQUENCY COORDINATOR

Graham Ratcliff, VK5AGR, presented his report. Copy attached.

Graham agreed to develop a format of the Satellite Frequency Data Base for uploading to the IARU website.

APPOINTMENT OF THE IARU AMSAT FREQUENCY COORDINATOR

Hans van de Groenendaal, ZS5AKV, nominated Graham Ratcliff for another term of office. This was unanimously endorsed by the Forum and accepted by Graham Ratcliff.

ARISS CALLSIGNS

ZS5AKV reported that Robert Jones of the ITU Radiocommunication Bureau had supplied the following advice: "the administration who has control over the particular radio station would be the one to issue the call sign." On the International Space Station, that could mean many different administrations could be assigning call signs to the different stations under their control. The principle is that for any given amateur radio station, an individual has to be responsible.

The forum agreed the following:

Considering:

That the International Space Station (ISS) is a project of many nations and

That the duties of Master of the ISS can be appointed from any of the participating nations,

The Forum recognises:

That the ISS is a completely new and unique situation, both in practice and in law, in that this and any future multinational vessel is not of a single nation in the common condition of terrestrial stations and, therefore, requires special consideration.

Therefore, in the cooperative spirit of multinational ventures in space,

The Forum requests IARU to approach the Secretary-General of the ITU with a view toward allocating a unique block of call signs for use by all future multi-national projects.

The Forum also requests IARU to encourage member societies in the ISS partner countries to seek the support of their national administration in approaching the Secretary-General to achieve this special call sign block allocation.

This is an urgent requirement as the first operation from the ISS will be early 2000. It may, as an interim measure, be necessary to fall back on a call signs assigned by the USA administration as they are the lead administration for ISS communication matters.

ARISS FREQUENCIES

ZS5AKV reported that the motion by the SARL to the IARU Region 1 conference to agree upon 144,490 MHz as an ARISS uplink was rejected. Despite several attempts, no compromise was reached.

The Forum expressed its deep disappointment that IARU Region 1 was not prepared to compromise by moving a few beacons in central Europe to accommodate a world-wide 144,490 MHz ISS uplink. The Forum noted that, in the USA and Canada, amateurs agreed to move several hundred APRS digipeaters from 145,790 MHz to permit the use of 145,800 MHz as a world-wide ARISS downlink frequency.

The Forum expressed disappointment that the Region 1 Conference was unable to agree on a single world-wide 2m uplink frequency for ARISS, and recommended that efforts to achieve this be continued through the IARU Satellite Adviser, as was recommended by the IARU Region 2 Conference in 1998. It was noted that 145,200 MHz is not usable in Region 2 due to heavy occupancy by voice repeaters. Since 2m ARISS operations are likely to begin before the next scheduled meeting of the Region 1 VHF/UHF Committee or the next Region 1 Conference, and it is necessary that there be a single world-wide uplink, it was recommended that use of 144,490 be continued on an interim basis until a permanent world-wide solution is developed.

SIX METRE SATELLITE ALLOCATION

At this stage there is no six metre allocation for the amateur-satellite service in the ITU Table of Frequency Allocations. AMSAT-NA will work with ARRL to lobby for a future allocation to the amateur-satellite service around 50MHz.

OPERATION OF FM SATELLITES

The Forum accepted the following recommendation to be published as a guideline for satellites carrying FM transponders operating in a "repeater-like" mode. All AMSAT groups are requested to work with their local IARU member society to encourage its use.

Recognising that satellites carrying FM transponders operating in a "repeater-like" mode require an appropriate set of operating procedures because they operate at a high altitude and cover a wide area. Therefore, the IARU International Satellite Forum recommends that operators use only the best of operating practice including:

• Using minimum power to accomplish the desired communication.

• Keeping transmissions short (maximum 20 seconds) with pauses between each transmission to allow other stations to break in.

• Having courtesy and consideration for other stations wishing to join a QSO.

• Ensuring that signals from the satellite can be heard before transmitting. Newcomers are urged to listen for at least one pass before making a call so that they can become acquainted with the conditions.

• Being aware of Doppler shift, especially when uplink frequencies are above 435 MHz, so as to compensate for Doppler shift in station operations.

NEXT MEETING OF THE FORUM

W2RS announced that the next meeting of the IARU International Satellite Forum will be held in conjunction with the AMSAT-UK Colloquium, at the University of Surrey, Guildford, England, in July 2000.