The Bromley and District Amateur Radio Society

SuitSat-1 SK - Nothing Heard for Several Days
by Frank KA3HDO

It has been days since a solid report of reception has come in, it is certain SuitSat's batteries have died.

While the transmission part of the SuitSat experiment has not been stellar, SuitSat-1 has been tremendously successful in several areas.
Some of these successes include:

-We have captured the imagination of students and the general public worldwide through this unique experiment

-The media attention to the SuitSat project represents one of the biggest ever for amateur radio

-We have had well over 2 million internet hits on www.suitsat.org today

-Our student's creative artwork, signatures and voices have been carried in space and are on-board the spacesuit---the students are now space travelers as the Suit rotates and orbits the Earth

-Carried in the spacesuit CD are pictures of Roy Neal, K6DUE, and Thomas Kieselbach, DL2MDE, two of our colleagues who have contributed to the ARISS program and have since passed away

-We successfully deployed an amateur radio satellite in a Spacesuit from the ISS, demonstrating to the space agencies that this can be safely done.

-This ARISS international team was able to fabricate, test and deliver a safe ham radio system to the ISS team 3 weeks after the international space agencies agreed to allow SuitSat to happen.
This was a tremendous feat in of itself.

SuitSat-1/Radioskaf is a space pioneering effort. Pioneering efforts are challenging. Risk is high. But the future payoff is tremendous. As you have seen, we have not had total success. But we have captured the imagination of the students and the general public. And we have already
learned a lot from this activity. This will help us and others grow from this experience.

Thanks to all who participated in this experiment!

73, Frank H. Bauer, KA3HDO
ARISS International Chairman
AMSAT-NA VP for Human Spaceflight Programs

Editors Note: I am sure that everyone in the UK Amateur radio community would like to congratulate Frank and the team, what a wonderful example of Amateur Radio at it's best.