karn (10/27/82)
It now appears POSSIBLE that STS-9, the first launch of the Spacelab, will carry an amateur radio station. Owen Garriot, W5LFL, who will be an astronaut on the mission, will be the operator. The Westlink Amateur Radio News service has been hypeing this topic up quite heavily in the past two weeks. Before everybody gets all excited, there are several caveats that should be remembered: 1. The proposal is not yet final. Significant progress is being made, however. 2. STS missions are launched into very low altitude, low inclination orbits. This means that passes are short (try dialing the 900 DIAL-IT number during a mission and listen to how often they hand off to a new tracking station). Passes visible from temperate latitudes are even quicker and at low elevations. 3. If they carry essentially a 2m walkie-talkie as proposed, without repeater capability, stations on the ground will not be able to hear each other as they attempt to contact the shuttle. Combine this with the adrenaline factor, and Garriot will likely not hear much more than interference unless the amateurs calling him are VERY disciplined. 4. Shuttle astronauts (and astronauts in general) are VERY busy people. It is not clear how much spare time Garriot will have to spend yakking on the radio. On the other hand, since the mission will last over a week and is primarily intended to ferry up Spacelab, perhaps he'll have some time. Phil Karn, KA9Q