Howdy folks, i was driving down a road in MountPearl Newfoundland Canada yesterday and heard what sounded like a local ham i know transmitting on 145.800mhz FM, so i listened some more and what i heard amazed me, i heard NA1SS transmitting, i was not sure if they were useing spit frequency or not so i said what the heck, i went back to there call, "NA1SS this is VO1MDS over!" They said "Go ahead sir, this is NA1SS the international space station" I said to myself, No way they heard me useing my radioshack HTX-202 while useing a rubber duckie antenna inside the car, so i said well lets see, i went back again, " NA1SS this is VO1MDS do you hear me over?" NA1SS said " Yes sir we here you go ahead!" i gave them my callsign, name, and QTH, as fast i heard NA1SS they disappered.

A 15 year old from Houston, Texas, has been selected as the 2009 Amateur Radio Newsline Young Ham of the Year. This, based on his dedication to public service as well as working to bring kids, teens and adults into the hobby. Amateur Radio Newsline's Mark Abramovich, NT3V, happens to chair the committee that made the decision and has the story of Andrew Koenig, KE5GDB:

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NT3V: "Andrew, you are the 2009 Young Ham of the Year."

KE5GDB: "You, you, you, you're serious?"

NT3V: "I'm very serious."

KE5GDB: "Wow! Oh, my God. All my friends here at Seabase are going to be really impressed. Oh, my God!"

According to NASA ISS Ham Radio Project Engineer Kenneth Ransom, N5VHO, there is a good possibility that groups participating in ARRL Field Day may be able to make a contact with one of the astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS).

"Some of the crew members of the International Space Station plan to make contacts with operators on the ground during Field Day operations as time permits" Ransom said. "Since the ISS now has a multinational crew representing all five space agencies, the possible club call signs to be heard are RS0ISS, NA1SS and OR4ISS. The crew could also elect to use their personal calls, as well. In either case, they will be signing 1A (Alfa) ISS after the call sign."

HERE IS THE LINK: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IoGE7kq25tc

73 de Manuel YV5MM

The Dayton Amateur Radio Association (DARA), host of the Dayton Hamvention®, has announced the winners of their three 2009 annual receive awards -- 2009 Amateur of the Year, the Technical Excellence Award and the Special Achievement Award -- at the annual event in May. Each year, DARA invites the amateur community to submit nominations of hams who have made significant contributions to the Amateur Radio Service.

Hamvention Chairman Carl Rose, K8CPR, praised the winners: "On behalf of the Dayton Amateur Radio Association and Hamvention 2009, it is my pleasure to congratulate this year's Award Winners. Their outstanding contributions and the many years of service exemplify what the Amateur Radio Service is."

Hello all. I found this on the RSGB website at www.rsgb.org and just thought I would post It here.....

The RSGB are dismayed to learn that a small group of AM enthusiasts based in the West Lothian district of Scotland continue to cause what appears to be deliberate interference to the ISS downlink frequency of 145.800MHz during ISS passes. The RSGB is concerned that despite several years of negotiation with this group and a change of band allocation to move them away from the internationally agreed ISS frequency, they continue to disrupt ISS operation by their selfish disregard of their fellow radio amateurs and the Band Plan. The RSGB intends to bring the matter up formally with Ofcom at a meeting of the RSGB/Ofcom Forum in early April.

Come together from the beginning the participation of the DXpedition K5D the method of Ham Satellite. And following in the Spotts www.issfanclub.com webpage, I noticed that the Mike Fincke, NA1SS had some calls and had not in K5D succeed.

So I decided to send an email (24/02/2009) to Mike, NA5U (KP1-P5 Project Leader), informing him that the astronaut was calling Desecheo Island.

Mike, NA5U kindly sent me an email reporting that the settings of the setup probably would not be correct, but he comes in contact with the team in K5D Desecheo Island.

The next day, 14:15 UTC (02/25/2009) the first pass of the ISS in the Brazilian coast, fortunately I got contact with Mike, NA1SS and told him that the team would be in K5D Desecheo Island QAP ISS repeater in the next pass.

Today I was checking out the New York City's metropolitan area repeater frequencies when I noticed that a few D-STAR repeaters are already active. Since I never really spent a single minute to find out what this new mode was all about I decided it was time to learn something new and eventually buy a new D-STAR radio. According to Wikipedia, D-STAR is "a digital voice and data protocol specification developed as the result of research by the Japan Amateur Radio League to investigate digital technologies for amateur radio. While there are other digital on-air technologies being used by amateurs that have come from other services, D-Star is one of the first on-air standards to be widely deployed and sold by a major radio manufacturer that is designed specifically for amateur service use" It looked interesting already but when I found that Miles Mann WF1F is proposing the adoption of the D-STAR based ICOM ID800 onboard the ISS I was almost convinced that it was time for me to buy one of these. Unfortunately, my enthusiasm cooled down when I read about some of the criticism that is raising around it.

Hi Everyone . im in the uniteded kingdom & i have just managed to recieve a braodcast on my childrens hand held wakie talkies from mike fincke on the iss CALL SIGN na1ss i was so shocked... I didn't even know that they where poeple aboard the ISS. I can only assume it was a repeater message as the range on the hand held walkie talkie is only 5miles .. but it did sound like he was talking to me he seemed to ask me for my call sign .The chat Kinda lasted 5mins then they faded away . Can any body explain this for me ? many thanks & happy christmas to all
Mark.
Hull.
England

The Astronaut Richard Garriott on the ISS used this software to help you take pictures of the earth. Richard sent some pictures of the screen via SSTV this software directly from Notebook. The "Windows on Earth" is an excellent digital simulation that allows the exploitation of the land of a window of the International Space Station.

For those who do not know and want to give the simulation between the link below:

http://winearth.terc.edu/appISSFlight/

To view SSTV images of software sent by Richard Garriott when he was on the ISS see the links below:

http://www.issfanclub.com/node/7802