Celebrating Indias First National Space Day on August 23, 2024

 The Government of India is launching a month long program to highligh the remarkable achievement of the country's space mission to inspire the nation's youth. We the radio amateurs, especially the LEO satellite operators, should take it as a great opportunity. We should also participate in the month long celebration with maximal number of contacts on LEO satellites. We should also strive to get an amateur radio satellite from India, sanctioned by Indian Space Research Organization. The theme for this year’s celebration is “Touching Lives while Touching the Moon: India’s Space Saga,”. It should also be an opportunity to bring more and more radio amateurs on LEO satellites. Most newbie radio amateurs are stuck to VHF repeaters with a handy. They should be made aware that they can use the very commonly available dual bander hand held radio for communicating through Low Earth Orbit Satellites.

While a VHF repeater can reach their signals may be a maximum of a few hundred kilometers, LEO satellite communications can extend their range of communication to thousands of kilometers. Recently, VU2TEK from Trivandrum, using a simple hand held radio and a homebrew tape measure Yagi could contact YD6AAB (Indonesia), 4S7NDR (Sri Lanka), S21HMX (Bangladesh), 9M2YOT (West Malaysia) and E29AHU (Thailand). That is a fantastic achievement which I have not been able to get even with a dual band base station. His operating technique is excellent, going outside and pointing the antenna directly at the satellite pass direction through out its course, enabling him to work DX stations with a very simple setup. It should be a great inspiration for any young radio amateur to take up LEO satellite operations. Here is a video clip shared by VU2TEK showing a couple of his DX contacts, shared directly by the operators with video recording.


73 de Jon, VU2JO

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