­Minutes of ARISS International Monthly Meeting
Go To Meeting/Teleconference
December 17, 2024 – 1200 UTC

Participants

Tanya Anderson
Frank Bauer
Randy Berger
Darin Cowan
Stefan Dombrowski
Ana Guzman
Micol Ivancic 
Keigo Komuro
Deb Lebair
Glenn MacDonell
Will Marchant
Lou McFadin
Ciaran Morgan
Martha Muir
Jan Poppeliers
Kenneth Ransom
Graham Shirville
Dave Taylor
Rosalie White
Satoshi Yasuda                 
 
 
Meeting December 17, 2024
  
Roll Call— Martha Muir W4MSA
              
Martha recorded the participants in today’s meeting by recording the names on the GoToMeeting screen.
 
 
Welcome – Frank Bauer
   
               Frank welcomed everyone to today’s meeting and began it by talking about the passing of ARISS Elder Statesman Gaston Bertels ON4WF. A moment of silence was held in Gaston’s honor. Gaston provided foundational support in the early days of ARISS, particularly through drafting and coordinating the adoption of the ARISS Terms of Reference. He was the ARISS Chair for several years.  And he led the development and installation of the Columbus module L/S band antenna systems, getting ESA approval to install them before the launch, fundraising for the project, and working with Pawel Kabacik from the Wroclaw University on antenna development, testing and certification. Before that, he conducted some of the first SAREX contacts from Europe, most notably the 1992 contact between astronaut Dirk Frimout, ON1AFD, with youth at the ESA.  Graham shared that Gaston inspired the European parliaments to support ARISS.  He will be greatly missed and greatly remembered, Graham concluded.   
Frank next introduced Deb Lebair, who will be taking over some of the ARISS website responsibilities from Carol Jackson and metrics activities from Rosalie. Deb might be contacting you if your school or engagement activity report is overdue.
Frank pointed out that this is the last meeting of the year.  We’ve had 1700 contacts in 24 years!
   
1.  Call for Acceptance Minutes – Frank Bauer and Martha Muir
 
Martha sent out the minutes of the November ARISS-I meeting prior to today’s meeting.
 Ciaran made a motion to accept the minutes and Rosalie seconded that motion.  The motion was accepted without dissent. They will be sent to Deb Lebair to be posted on the ARISS website.
 

2.  HamTV Update – Kenneth Ransom
 
Kenneth said that the topology assessment has been completed by ESA.It is now
 in the review cycle.  After that is completed, we can start installing the HamTV system.  

3.  ARISS-I Delegates Face to Face Meeting – Glenn MacDonell

Glenn said that the first person to book a hotel is Shizuo!   The hotel now has an internet link for us to use.  Click on the link and select the room type that you want.   Glenn was asked to send out that link to ARISS I.  He will check into visa requirements. 
Glenn said that he is still waiting to hear which representative from CSA will be speaking with us.    
The 2025 ARISS-I meeting will be from Monday, April 7, to Wednesday, April 9.

5.  Axiom IV – Frank Bauer

Frank said that we will be supporting this venture.  Peggy Whitson will be the commander of this crew.  The other crew members are from Poland, Hungary, and India.  Those three have agreed to be involved making ham radio contacts while on the ISS, at least two school contacts each.  The launch is scheduled for no earlier than May 16 and the mission is scheduled to continue for 14 days.   (If that schedule holds, perhaps we will do something with this at the Dayton Hamvention.)

Any Other Business
 

• Frank said that the NAVCOM experiment was launched on SpaceX-31 and is close to integration on ISS.  It will be using the ARISS S-band antennas to support an experiment on Lunar Navigation.  NAVCOM will perform 10 passes over four ground stations in Italy to conduct the experiment. GNSS-like navigation receivers on the moon plan to use a segment of S-band for their navigation signal, which has been coordinated internationally. 
  

• Frank said that there is a proposal in work that would be a partnership with NASA-KSC for an externally mounted payload on Artemis IV.  This would include an amateur radio payload located at the lunar south pole.  This will require us to reinvigorate AREX if NASA asks for a step 2 proposal. 

 

• Mission Opportunity #1 (MO#1).  Frank expects to talk more about this at the January and/or February meetings.  Because ARISS is under a Non-Disclosure Agreement during feasibility and initial development, it currently involves a limited number of ARISS team members, mainly the USA and ESA teams.  This project is supported by members from Education, Operations, and Engineering.     

 

• Will said that the next SSTV event will run until January 5.  Frank showed attendees a ‘rough draft’ of the 12 images, which includes an ESA tribute to Gaston.   Will said he will announce this program via social media before school lets out on Friday.

 

• Frank wished everyone a Happy Holiday season.  Merry Christmas.  Happy New Year.  Happy Hannukah.  Happy whatever you celebrate.

 
We need to continue to build up the team.We will talk about this at the Face-to-Face meeting.
 
Next Meeting:  January 21, 2025.

Minutes of ARISS International Monthly Meeting
Go To Meeting/Teleconference
November 19, 2024 – 1200 UTC

Participants
 
Oliver Amend
Tanya Anderson
Frank Bauer
Randy Berger
Stefan Dombrowski
Shizuo Endo
Ana Guzman
Micol Ivancic  
Glenn MacDonell
Will Marchant
Lou McFadin
Ciaran Morgan
Martha Muir
Jan Poppeliers
Kenneth Ransom
Jim Reed
Sergey Samburov
Graham Shirville
Dave Taylor
Rosalie White

Interpreter:  Maria Pogodina                 
 

Meeting  November 19, 2024
 
Roll Call— Martha Muir W4MSA
     
Martha recorded the participants in today’s meeting by recording the names on the GoToMeeting screen.


Welcome – Frank Bauer
   
        Frank welcomed everyone to today’s meeting and said this month has been spectacular with several outstanding school contacts with educational activities.  Also there were two wonderful SSTV events, one of which ended yesterday.  Thank you for everything you do.    

1.     Call for Acceptance of Minutes – Frank Bauer and Martha Muir
Martha sent out the minutes of the October ARISS-I meeting prior to today’s meeting.
 
Stefan made a motion to accept the minutes and Ciaran seconded that motion.  The motion was accepted without dissent. They will be sent to Deb Lebair to be posted on the ARISS website.


2.    HamTV Update – Kenneth Ransom
Kenneth said that we are waiting for the final topology report to be completed. After that, the HamTV will be integrated into the Columbus module.  Frank mentioned that there are new people at NASA and at ESA working on this assessment and have started from scratch, which is why it is taking so long.  Frank asked Oliver if we can get Ham TV CAD model to move this along faster.  Oliver said he will ask Kaiser.  

An HDMI converter is needed to support the new cameras on-board ISS.  Randy expects that the HDMI converter will be launched to the ISS mid-next year.  

3.    ARISS-I Delegates Face to Face Meeting – Oliver Amend and Glenn MacDonell
Glenn said the hotel we used at the last Face to Face meeting in Canada has agreed to hold several rooms for ARISS at a good price-point.  People who will be attending should contact the hotel and book their rooms directly.  For the special rates at the hotel, mention that you are with the ARISS delegation.  He has asked the CSA for a presentation on their Lunar Gateway initiatives and they are working on it.  
Oliver said he is collecting suggested topics to discuss at the meeting and will sort them into the meeting days in the near future.  
Frank asked everyone to get suggested topics to Oliver by December 15.   He also asked Glenn to put together the name of the hotel, the special rates, and contact information for the hotel and send it to the officers for distribution to the team.  Oliver will send this out to everyone.  
Frank thanked Glenn and Oliver for their work on our next Face to Face meeting.

4.    SSTV Update – Sergey Samburov
Sergey said that he is very happy with the results of the SSTV transmissions, which include images of the first use of ham radio in human space flight.  Hams, educators and youth from all over the world were involved and received diplomas.  Thanks to everyone involved in this, especially Armand and Slawek.   
Will said that image gallery has been moved to cloud based image storage system at this address:  https://ariss-usa.org/ARISS_SSTV.  There is also a new method to request a certificate but there were a couple of glitches during operations that have since been fixed.  This new system aligns well with the awards program that the team in Poland has been supporting for so many years.  
Rosalie thanked Will for adding a “Please Donate” button to the web page.  We have already received donations from it.   
Oliver said an Indonesian group had their own certificates that featured an image of Owen Garriott.  A Chilean group also had their own certificate.  
A map showed SSTV from all over the world.  There was a lot of activity in the USA, Europe, and Asia.  
Sergey said would like to do another SSTV event during the last week of December and the first week of January.  The images will include seasonal greetings and images of great ARISS related activities of the past year and asked international folks to start gathering their images to be used.    
Sergey thanked Slawek, Armand, and Will for their work curating the images and certificates.  He would like to prepare some special awards for them.  
**Action Item:  Each  region should provide 2 images to be used for this event.  We will add a Seasons Greeting image and Sergey will provide 3 images.  Please send your two images to Frank by December 10.

AOB  (Any Other Business)
-    Rosalie said she would no longer be taking in Activity Reports and numbers.  Please send them to Deb Lebair at [email protected]

-      Thanks to Maria for interpreting today.
Next Meeting:  December 17, 2024

Minutes of ARISS International Monthly Meeting
Go To Meeting/Teleconference
  October 15, 2024 – 1200 UTC

Participants
 
Oliver Amend
Tanya Anderson
Kerry Banke
Frank Bauer
Randy Berger
Armand Budzianowski
Stefan Dombrowski
Shizuo Endo
Ana Guzman
Micol Ivancic  
Dave Jordan
Glenn MacDonell
Will Marchant
Lou McFadin
Ciaran Morgan
Martha Muir
Michel Nawrocki
Jan Poppeliers
Kenneth Ransom
Sergey Samburov
Graham Shirville
Dave Taylor
Rosalie White
Satoshi Yasuda

Interpreter:  Oxana Giannetti                 
 

Meeting October 15, 2024
 
Roll Call— Martha Muir W4MSA
     
Martha recorded the participants in today’s meeting by recording the names on the GoToMeeting screen.


Welcome – Frank Bauer
   
        Frank welcomed everyone to today’s meeting and said this month has been spectacular and featured an outstanding SSTV event and school contacts around the world.    

1.     Call for Acceptance of Minutes – Frank Bauer and Martha Muir
Martha sent out the minutes of the September ARISS-I meeting prior to today’s meeting.
 Ciaran made a motion to accept the minutes and Glenn seconded that motion.  The motion was accepted without dissent. They will be sent to Carol to be posted on the ARISS website.


2.    HamTV Update – Kenneth Ransom
Kenneth said that work continues on the topology assessment and they are
 moving closer to approval.  Next up:  installation.  
Graham said that Noel Matthews gave a presentation at the RSGB meeting this past
 weekend.  Graham asked if it would be appropriate to present it at the upcoming AMSAT Symposium.  Frank said it might be good for folks on the ARISS team but he (Frank) is not in charge of the symposium schedule.  Get in touch with Dan Schultz.  Frank said it might be good to have a separate ARISS meeting and have Noel make his presentation there.  Graham said that Noel’s presentation was aimed at folks who do not know much about ARISS.
Frank said that when the HamTV unit was moved to a new location because another payload is now in the planned spot for HamTV, the HamTV cable was not long enough.  Thanks to the fact that we have the MarconISSta cables on-board, one of the MarconISSta cables was long enough to support HamTV operations.  “It is nice to have extra equipment available on the ISS.”

3.    ARISS-I Delegates Face to Face Meeting – Oliver Amend and Glenn MacDonell
Oliver asked Glenn for any updates about the facilities for the Face to Face meeting.   Glenn said he is working the dates with his contacts at the CSA.  In trying to work with the hotels, he asked for an estimate of the number of people who will likely attend.  Frank said he estimates about 30 for the hotels.  Oliver asked delegates to let him know if they will or will not need hotel accommodations.  Oliver is also asking for suggestions of topics to be discussed at the meeting such as new telebridge requirements or changes to the ARISS-I webpages.  Please get your topic suggestions to the ARISS-I officers.  Oliver thanked Glenn for keeping us up to date on this.
Frank said that we should add someone from CSA to speak about Gateway at the meeting.  Glenn said we would probably want to hear Ken Gutswaldy talk about this.  Glenn will ask him about this.  
Frank said we need to ensure we have a robust virtual meeting capability.  Glenn said he will check into this.  Rosalie said we had virtual meeting capability when ARISS-I met there before.

4.    SSTV Activities – Sergey Samburov
Frank congratulated Sergey on a successful SSTV event.  Sergey thanked Frank for his comment.  He said it took several years but it was successful.  It was not easy with the new computer but with great effort we had great results.  It was joint effort of the whole ARISS team.   It was a good idea to be able to do this in the Service Module.  Thanks to Southwest University for their work on this.  The number of diplomas (certificates) earned is unknown but Armand may be able to tell us.  
Frank asked Sergey if we will able to use different modes with the new software.  Sergey said he will ask Southwest University to work on this.  
Will thanked Sergey and his team.  There have been more than 7000 submittals so far from over 2700 individuals, from over 200 high school or younger students, from over 200 teachers in high schools or younger, and from over 200 college level students and teachers.  This was a tremendously popular activity.  
Oliver showed a show of several of Armand’s slides as Armand presented his comments:   Participants commented on the quality of the slides.  Requests for awards are still coming in.  The awards were created by Slawek Szymanowski.  He is glad that SSTV is online again.  Thanks for all who made this possible including the folks on the ISS.  
Oliver thanked Armand and the PZK team.  Armand continued saying that he will keep the request for awards open until tomorrow.  He has to make sure that the 1000 plus emails with awards he sent out is not classified as spam.  Armand appreciates the international cooperation on this.  Thank you for the kind words.  
Frank said the ham radio community, youth, and teachers all enjoy this.  

AOB  (Any Other Business)
-    Frank talked about the ARISS contact with the Girl Guiding Group.  Royalty was present!  The Duchess of Edinburgh was there.  Ciaran and Graham were running this.  The Duchess said she had many more questions she would have liked to have asked Sunni Williams.  Ciaran expressed his thanks to Graham and other members of the team.  

-    Frank said that some transitions are coming up.  Carol Jackson will continue to serve as treasurer for ARISS-US but is stepping back from some other duties.  Rosalie is stepping back on some metrics duties.  Frank has brought on board Deb Lebair.  She used to work on satellites for NASA.  After that she became a middle school teacher.  She comes from a family of hams, including her brother and her father.  

-    The next ARISS-I meeting will be on November 19.  Notice the UTC time change to 1200 UTC.  This accommodates the time changes in some areas.  This may impact Ops meetings, too.

-    Thanks to Oxana for her interpretations and to everyone for attending this meeting.
Next Meeting:  November 19, 2024

­Minutes of ARISS International Monthly Meeting
Go To Meeting/Teleconference
September 17, 2024 – 1100 UTC
 
Participants
 
Oliver Amend
Tanya Anderson
Frank Bauer
Randy Berger
Armand Budzianowski
Shizuo Endo
Gianpietro Ferrario
Bertus Husken
Micol Ivancic 
Glenn MacDonell
Lou McFadin
Ciaran Morgan
Martha Muir
Michel Nawrocki
Jan Poppeliers
Kenneth Ransom
Graham Shirville
Dave Taylor
Rosalie White
Satoshi Yasuda
 
Meeting September 17, 2024
  
Roll Call— Martha Muir W4MSA
               Martha recorded the participants in today’s meeting by recording the names on the GoToMeeting screen.
 
Welcome – Frank Bauer
               Frank welcomed everyone to today’s meeting.  He said that there are many school contacts going on these days around the world. Thank you!!  
 
 1) Call for Acceptance of Minutes – Frank Bauer and Martha Muir
Martha sent out the minutes of the August meeting prior to today’s meeting.Glenn made a motion to accept the minutes.Ciaran seconded that motion which was accepted without dissent.The minutes will be sent to Carol Jackson for posting on the ARISS-I website.
 
 2) HamTV Operations – Kenneth Ransom and Randy Berger
Kenneth said that there are no changes to report at this time except that he met with Mark Magno, graphic illustrator, who is working on the placement of the HamTV equipment to ensure it will fit with another payload called Lidal in the space station.
 
 
 3) ARISS-International Delegates  Face to Face Meeting 2025 – Oliver Amend and Glenn MacDonell
 
Glenn said that the meeting is scheduled to run from Monday, April 7, through Wednesday, April 9 next year.  There are no changes on hotels since the last ARISS Face to Face meeting in Canada. 

Oliver went over the proposed schedule that is based on the schedule of previous Face to Face meetings:  education and development on Tuesday and Operations on Wednesday.  There will be a discussion of changing the meaning of the ARISS abbreviation.  Oliver will send a draft of this schedule to Glenn for planning purposes.  He also said that he needs the Regional and Committee reports. 
  
 4) Axiom-4 Update – Frank Bauer 
Axiom-4 will be flown on Space-X, probably in the first quarter of next year.  Three of the four crew members have an Amateur Radio license. 
In Europe, there are some legal concerns that are being worked. These concerns  are about privacy information, including the use of some images of youth, particularly in Poland.

5) Transition Plan from Kenneth to Ana – Kenneth Ransom                  
Kenneth will retire from Barrios next April.  Ana Guzman, Kenneth’s backup, will become the lead after Kenneth’s retirement. This gives Ana  time to learn about all the things that Kenneth does.  The plan is for Kenneth to step back in February and let Ana take over.  Kenneth will stay in the background and cover for Ana when she attends the ARISS International meeting.   Once retired, Kenneth plans to retire from obligations for about 6 months and then come back as an ARISS volunteer. 
Frank said that Kenneth has been instrumental in ARISS success.

Any Other Business
-Frank:   We celebrated Gaston Bertel’s 97th birthday a couple of days ago.  We want to recognize Gaston.  He was doing ARISS things before there was an ARISS.  He did a contact during the STS-45 Space Shuttle mission in 1992.  He led the development of the L band and S band antennas on the Columbus module.   The officers want to make a proclamation of Gaston as ARISS Elder Statesman.  Rosalie said that he led the team and did so many things for ARISS.  Graham said “I’m delighted with this idea.”

  Region votes on this proclamation:  Glenn, speaking for Canada:  Yes.  Shizuo, speaking .for Japan:  Yes.  Ciaran, Bertus, and Oliver, speaking for Europe:  Yes   Dave T. and Rosalie, speaking for the United States: Yes.  The vote supporting this proclamation is unanimous.

Dave Taylor:  Today is Konstantin Tsiolkovsky’s birthday, which is probably why Sergey is not with us today.
 
Frank thanked everyone for participating in today’s meeting.
 
Next Meeting:   October 15, 2024

­Minutes of ARISS International Monthly Meeting
Go To Meeting/Teleconference
August 20, 2024 – 1200 UTC
 
Participants
 
Oliver Amend
Tanya Anderson
Frank Bauer
Randy Berger
Armand Budzianowski
Shizuo Endo
Gianpietro Ferrario
Micol Ivancic 
Kiego Komuro
Glenn MacDonell
Will Marchant
Lou McFadin
Ciaran Morgan
Martha Muir
Michel Nawrocki
Eric Oosterbaan
Jan Poppeliers
Kenneth Ransom
Sergey Samburov
Graham Shirville
Dave Taylor
Rosalie White
Satoshi Yasuda
 
Interpreter:  Alexandra Tussing
 
Meeting August 20, 2024
  
Roll Call— Martha Muir W4MSA
               Martha recorded the participants in today’s meeting by recording the names on the GoToMeeting screen.
 
Welcome – Frank Bauer
               Frank welcomed everyone to today’s meeting.  He asked attendees to recruit folks who might make great additions to our team.  
 
1.  Call for Acceptance of Minutes – Frank Bauer and Martha Muir
Martha sent out the minutes of the July meeting prior to today’s meeting.Rosalie made a motion to accept the minutes.Glenn seconded that motion which was accepted without dissent.The minutes will be sent to Carol Jackson for posting on the ARISS-I website.
 
2. HamTV Operations – Kenneth Ransom and Randy Berger
Kenneth said that there are no changes to report at this time.He is waiting for the topology folks to finish their task.He added that the topology teams in the US and Europe have changed and the new CAD models didn’t get to the new guys.Randy said work continues on the HDMI adaptor which will be sent to the space station to allow HamTV to connect to the newer ISS cameras as the older ones are being phased out.
 
 
3. ARISS-International Delegates  Face to Face Meeting 2025 – Oliver Amend
Glenn has confirmed that the Canadian Space Agency has agreed to host this meeting during the first or second week of April next year.  No one said that they had a conflict with either week.  Given that, Oliver proposed the F2F meeting be held from April 7 to April 10.   Sergey said he would like to attend this meeting and see everyone again.  He will have to see if can get a visa in time to attend. 
By the end of the year, the officers will be asking for end of year reports.  If you have agenda items to be included for discussion during this meeting, please get them to the officers, too. 
“Thank you, Glenn, for taking the lead on this,” Frank said.

4. SSTV Updates – Sergey Samburov 
There is a lot of interest in SSTV among the ham, education, and youth communities.
Sergey reported that a cargo vehicle docked at the ISS last Saturday.The SSTV hardware is part of that cargo.There are tentative plans to begin to start integration of the SSTV system in September but there are many other things going on aboard the ISS that month including a crew rotation and cargo vehicles arriving/departing.Sergey asked that if anyone has images for possible use, please let him know.Frank reminded him that SSTV images commemorating events over 40 years of amateur radio on Human Spaceflight missions are available.

AOB  (Any Other Business) 

• Frank:  The ISS is scheduled to be decommissioned in 2030 but we hope to continue our projects on commercial space stations.  Given that, we need to take the widely known and respected name “ARISS” and adjust what those letters represent (branding) as we switch to private space stations.   This is likely to be an Agenda item for next year’s Face to Face meeting.  In an e-mail, Frank suggested Amateur Radio-International on Space Stations. Lou suggested we come up with a list of things we would wish the new space stations could support for us like direct contacts to ground and telephone / video contacts.  “What would we like these space stations to do?”    

The commercial world is different now.Some are international, some are national. The “business model” is different too. This includes who will share the cost of these amateur radio STEM education operations. The Space Agencies provide significant “In-Kind” funding (absorbed costs) and ARISS provides significant “In-Kind” support via volunteers.What will our real dollar (Euro, etc) costs be to perform these operations on these space stations?Will we incur cost to launch and use volume and power on these vehicles? We want to prepare ourselves for this different future.
 
-Randy reported that ARISS had four summer interns this year.They built four pico tuners for HamTV.They presented their work at NASA Goddard with SCaN leaders attending.Randy said he would like to thank the UK team for their help with this.
 
[Frank had to leave this meeting.Oliver took over as presider.]
 
-Oliver reported that Frank, Tanya, Randy and Kelly Cammarrano represented ARISS at the recent ISS R&D meeting.Representatives from space agencies and developers were present and this team was there to talk to these folks about ARISS.It is good to let these folks know the work we do with education.VAST wants to know if we can do a contact for them during World Space Week 2025.

 
Oliver thanked everyone for participating in today’s meeting.
Next Meeting:   September 17, 2024

­Minutes of ARISS International Monthly Meeting
Go To Meeting/Teleconference
July 16, 2024 – 1200 UTC
 
Participants
 
Oliver Amend
Tanya Anderson
Frank Bauer
Stefan Dombrowski
Shizuo Endo
Ana Guzman
Bertus Husken
Micol Ivancic 
Kiego Komuro
Will Marchant
Lou McFadin
Martha Muir
Michel Nawrocki
Ken Nichols
Jan Poppeliers
Kenneth Ransom
Graham Shirville
Dave Taylor
Rosalie White
Satoshi Yasuda
 
 
Meeting July 16, 2024
  
Roll Call— Martha Muir W4MSA
               Martha recorded the participants in today’s meeting by recording the names on the GoToMeeting screen.
 
Welcome – Frank Bauer
               Frank welcomed everyone to today’s meeting and said that today marks the 55th anniversary of the launch of Apollo 11!
 
1. Call for Acceptance of Minutes – Frank Bauer and Martha Muir

Martha sent out the minutes of the June meeting prior to today’s meeting.Bertus made a motion to accept the June minutes.Rosalie seconded that motion which was accepted without dissent.The minutes will be sent to Carol Jackson for posting on the ARISS-I website.
 
2. HamTV Operations – Kenneth Ransom

Kenneth said that there is another payload installed in the place where the HamTV unit is supposed to go on the ISS.We are waiting for NASA to redo the topology for both payloads.It will be at least three months for the HamTV unit to be back in place.
 
3.  Ham Radio -2024 – Oliver Amend
 
Oliver reported that this was the 46th Ham Radio event and is the most important ham radio exhibition in Europe.There were 11.300 attendees this year including 93 teachers who attended a teachers’ workshop on Friday.There were 4 presentations on ARISS throughout the exhibition.Stefan, Oliver, and Frank spent time in the ARISS booth.Next year’s theme is likely to be ’75 years of DARC.’
 
4. ARISS-I Delegates Face to Face Meeting 2025 – Oliver Amend and Frank Bauer

Face to Face meeting in 2025:where do we want to have it?At last month’s ARISS-Imeeting, Glenn suggested that ARISS-Canada could host it.No one else offered a different location.Glenn reported that since last month’s meeting he has found out that the Canadian Space Agency has agreed to host us.Now we need to figure out when it will be.Perhaps in April?Block off April 12.Delegates:please check your calendar for go/no go dates prior to next month’s meeting.Glenn will check in to the visa requirements for Sergey.

5.   ARISS Engineering Team Proposal – Randy Berger and Oliver Amend

Oliver presented the ARISS TES Committee Status Report. Topics to be discussed by this committee include ARISS-Pi, HDMI, and CAVIAR.Oliver wants to know who wants to join this committee.Randy and Oliver will be chairmen.Lou is in.Shizuo wants to know how often the committee will meet.Oliver replied ‘once per month at a time that works for all.’Shizuo will get back to Oliver about this.
 
AOB  (Any Other Business) 

• Bertus suggested that since SSTV will be out for a while, how about digital SSTV?  Jan P. knows about this.  Perhaps add him and this idea on the TES committee list.  Frank said that this would require multiple ground stations and control operators for long periods of time.    We don’t have the hardware to do this automatically yet.

 

• Kenneth reported that August 15 is the scheduled launch date for the SSTV system.

 

• Graham said that he has adjusted the Wiki site to say that the date of HamTV is TBD, not next month.

 
Next Meeting:  August 20, 2024

­Minutes of ARISS International Monthly Meeting
Go To Meeting/Teleconference
June 18, 2024 – 1200 UTC
 
Participants
 
Oliver Amend
Tanya Anderson
Frank Bauer
Randy Berger
Armand Budzianowski
Stefan Dombrowski
Shizuo Endo
Micol Ivancic 
Dave Jordan
Kiego Komuro
Will Marchant
Lou McFadin
Ciaran Morgan
Martha Muir
Ken Nichols
Jan Poppeliers
Kenneth Ransom
Sergey Samburov
Dave Taylor
Rosalie White
Satoshi Yasuda
 
Interpreter:   Alexandra Tussing                 
 
 
Meeting June 18, 2024
  
Roll Call— Martha Muir W4MSA
               Martha recorded the participants in today’s meeting by recording the names on the GoToMeeting screen.
 
Welcome – Frank Bauer
               Frank welcomed everyone to today’s meeting and said that there are many things going on in the ARISS community these days.  The Starliner will be launched soon, taking two astronauts to the ISS, including ARISS veteran Suni Williams.    Coming soon:  Ham Radio at Friedrichshafen.  Frank will be there.
 
1. Call for Acceptance of Minutes – Frank Bauer and Martha Muir
Martha sent out the minutes of the March and May ARISS-I meetings prior to today’s meeting.Rosalie made a motion to accept the March minutes.Stefan seconded that motion which was accepted without dissent.Stefan made a motion to accept last month’s (May) minutes.Dave Taylor seconded that motion, which was accepted without dissent.Both minutes will be sent to Carol Jackson for posting on the ARISS-I website.
 
2. HamTV Operations Operations – Kenneth Ransom
Kenneth said that no progress has been made with HamTV.In fact, there is another payload presently occupying the space where HamTV is supposed to go.Kenneth is monitoring this.
 
3. ARISS-I International Delegates Meeting – Frank Bauer and Oliver Amend
Frank said that we need to decide where we want to hold the next Face to Face meeting next year.Oliver concurred. Please let us know by July’s meeting.Suggesting a location does not mean that you are organizing this meeting.
Glenn asked if people would be interested in meeting in Canada again. The Canadian Space Agency is involved in the Gateway program; it would be great to get updates.Glenn was asked to investigate the possibility of holding the next meeting near the Canadian Space Agency and send the info to the ARISS-I officers.
 
4. SSTV Update – Sergey Samburov
Sergey said that it is a large scale operation to get the new SSTV system on the ISS.Certain tests need to be performed.Those tests should start on July 1.Alexander Grebenkin, a Russian cosmonaut, should be installing the system on the ISS in September.The crew is very busy and a new crew is scheduled to arrive in September.We hope to get the system operational soon.
Sergey was asked to let us know when we can put information about this on social media and he stated we should wait until it is ready for launch.
Frank thanked Sergey for his work on this since ISS SSTV downlinks are very popular with students and hams alike.He thanked Sergey for working with students at the Southwestern State University in Kursk to develop both the software and hardware.
 
AOB  (Any Other Business) 
               Frank reported that Barbara Adde from SCAN will be retiring from NASA at the end of the month.  Frank also reported that the SCAN office is reorganizing with a new head, Kevin Coggins.  SCAN provides part of the funding to sustain ARISS operations.  Kevin is a ham and is interested in what we do with education and providing back up communications.  He might be more involved in ARISS opportunities, including the ARISS contact at the upcoming IAU conference in August in South Africa .   Ken Bowersox, an ARISS astronaut alumnus, is Kevin’s supervisor. 
               Randy said he would like to thank the ARISS-UK folks for their efforts to support the HamTV ground station development tutorial website.  Randy has two summer interns developing ground stations in the USA using hardware that the UK team have shipped to the US for this purpose. 
               Frank thanked Alexandra for her interpreting.  He also thanked everyone for attending today’s meeting.
Next Meeting:  July 16, 2024
  Lou pointed out that this will be the 55th anniversary of the launch of Apollo 11.  
 

­Minutes of ARISS International Monthly Meeting
Go To Meeting/Teleconference
  May 21, 2024 – 1200 UTC
 
Participants
 
Oliver Amend
Tanya Anderson
Frank Bauer
Randy Berger
Emanuele D’Andria
Stefan Dombrowski
Shizuo Endo
Micol Ivancic 
Kiego Komuro
Will Marchant
Lou McFadin
Martha Muir
Jan Poppeliers
Kenneth Ransom
Sergey Samburov
Graham Shirville
Dave Taylor
Rosalie White
Satoshi Yasuda
 
Interpreter:  Anya Ezhevskaya                 
 
 
Meeting May 21, 2024
  
Roll Call— Martha Muir W4MSA
            Martha recorded the participants in today’s meeting by recording the names on the GoToMeeting screen.
 
Welcome – Frank Bauer
            Frank welcomed everyone to today’s meeting and said he just returned from Hamvention, which is the largest hamfest in the US.  There were a number of international groups there including RSGB, DARC, and JARL.  Folks who came by our booth were excited at all the things the ARISS international team is doing.  Rosalie added that people appreciate getting HAM TV back on the ISS and are looking forward to more SSTV events.
 

1.  Call for Acceptance of Minutes – Frank Bauer and Martha Muir

Martha sent out the minutes of the April ARISS-I meeting prior to today’s meeting.Frank made
 a motion to accept the minutes and Oliver seconded that motion.  The motion was accepted without dissent. They will be sent to Carol to be posted on the ARISS website.
 
2. HamTV Operations Update – Kenneth Ransom
Kenneth said that the HamTV unit was taken back to the ISS on SpaceX 30. He estimates
 that July represents the earliest chance for operations as it won’t be probably installed until then.  It should work like it did the last time it was operational on the ISS.  Randy is working on developing a series of ground stations in the USA for HamTV.  Randy said that Lou McFadin and Kerry Banke will be working with some summer interns on this.  Dave Taylor and Randy said that the webpage that Graham and other UK members of the BATC developed for HamTV is very good and should be posted somewhere for more folks to access.  Frank added that there were many requests for this at  Hamvention; he suggests that the URL be sent to Carol for posting on the ARISS website.
Link: https://wiki.batc.org.uk/HAMTV_from_the_ISS
 
3. Axiom 4 Status –  Frank Bauer
Frank said that Axiom 4 is scheduled to launch in November and may be bumped to early next year.At least one crew member wants to use our equipment.Oliver added that Polish astronaut Slawosz Uznanski is actively pursuing his ham radio license in Poland.
 
4.  CAVIAR – Randy Berger
CAVIAR stands for Communications, Audio, Video and Imaging using Amateur Radio. This was initially developed for lunar gateway missions but can be used on lunar, ISS, and Gateway projects.It is a hexagonal shaped device that originally had 3 SDRs that now has been reduced to just one plus RF switches.It is set for 5 GHz receive and 10 GHz transmit.It will have SSTV and telemetry capabilities that can be accessed at ground stations.Randy suggests we set up a committee to select what projects to use it with soon.Oliver will set this meeting up.

5. Next Year’s International Delegates’ Meeting and ARISS-I:  25 years of Operations! – Every Region
Frank said that next year will mark 25 years of continuous operation of ARISS.    Where do we want to have our next International Delegated meeting?  Who wants to host it?  It would be nice to hold it near a space agency but it doesn’t have to be.  Rosalie said that in the past, it has been held in conjunction with an AMSAT meeting.  We are looking something in the Spring or Fall of 2025. 

Oliver said there are two key things for the host to secure:  hotels for the attendees and a meeting space.  Others can help with the other details.

Frank said this will be on the Agenda for coming meetings until it gets settled.  It is important for us to get together.

AOB  (Any Other Business) 
            Frank thanked Anya for her interpretation.  He thanked everyone for attending today’s meeting.
Next Meeting:  June 18, 2024
 
Respectfully submitted, Martha Muir, ARISS-I Secretary

­Minutes of ARISS International Monthly Meeting
Go To Meeting/Teleconference
  April 16, 2024 – 1200 UTC
 
Participants
 
Oliver Amend
Tanya Anderson
Frank Bauer
Randy Berger
Armand Budzianowski
Stefan Dombrowski
Darin Cowan
Emanuele D’Andria
Shizuo Endo
Micol Ivancic 
Dave Jordan
Kiego Komuro
Glenn MacDonell
Will Marchant
Lou McFadin
Ciaran Morgan
Martha Muir
Ken Nichols
Jan Poppeliers
Kenneth Ransom
Graham Shirville
Dave Taylor
Rosalie White
Satoshi Yasuda
 
 
Meeting Agenda
 
Welcome—Frank Bauer KA3HDO
 
            Frank welcomed everyone and shared that the total solar eclipse last week was spectacular!  He and Kenneth are in Huntsville, Alabama for a POIG meeting.
The minutes for March’s meeting as well as for the Face-to-Face meeting in February are not available yet.  There will be two sets of minutes for review next month.   

1.  Status of HamTV Operations Update – Frank Bauer and Kenneth Ransom

Kenneth reported that there was a successful launch of SpaceX 30 on March 21, 2024. The HamTV unit is now on the ISS!   Oliver asked when they expect the system to be operational again.  Summer or fall was the reply.
 
2.    40th Anniversary and ARISS International Meeting Follow-on Discussions – Frank Bauer
            Frank said that there are many after-event activities going on about those great meetings including merging the minutes with the presentations. 
             Frank said he let the Gateway Program know about the AMSAT-Italia proposal and the possibility of pass throughs.  He reminded everyone that we as ARISS need to speak with one voice and we need to work as one team.  He asks all to not go directly to a contractor for a space agency without getting permission from the governing program to do so. Otherwise, we risk being totally shut out of the program.  Programs have a design baseline and we need to work within their “study path” or get selected through official payload proposal solicitations.  Shizuo said that there needs to be some discussion and consensus about the Italian plans before we go further.  Frank agreed and said ARISS needs to reach a consensus on a plan, including frequencies, before ARISS can fully endorse the proposal.  We also need word from the Gateway program that is it OK to proceed.  This was an action taken by the officers at the Face to Face meeting. 
Emanuele added that he doesn’t want to miss this opportunity for antenna feedthroughs on Gateway.  Subsequent discussions included the importance of talking with TASI in an official way.  Frank requested that while we wait for comments back from Gateway, we should commission an internal sub-committee to discuss interfaces, frequency plan and antenna designs.  That way we will have the data ready for I-HAB. This subcommittee should include members of AMSAT-Italia and the ARISS engineering team. 
 
AOB  (Any other business)

• Oliver:  The 2025 Delegates meeting – anyone volunteering to organize and host it?  Do we need to have a meeting?  We will discuss this at the next meeting.  Your homework is to think about this. 
• Randy reiterated that with the June deadline approaching on the interface needs from  I-HAB that we need the subcommittee meeting ASAP. 

 
Respectfully submitted, Martha Muir, ARISS-I Secretary

Minutes of ARISS International Monthly Meeting
Go To Meeting/Teleconference
  March 19, 2024 – 1200 UTC
  
Participants
 Oliver Amend
Frank Bauer
Randy Berger
Emanuelle D’Andria
Stefan Dombrowski
Will Marchant
Glenn MacDonell
Lou McFadin
Martha Muir
Kenneth Ransom
Sergey Samburov
Diana Schuler
Dave Taylor
Rosalie White
 
 Interpreter:  Irina Yaskova
 
Meeting Agenda
 
Roll Call—Martha Muir, W4MSA
  
Welcome—Frank Bauer KA3HDO
 
              Frank welcomed everyone to today’s meeting and saying that it was great to see so many of you at the Face to Face meeting and the 40th Anniversary celebration. 
              Ham TV is scheduled to go up to the ISS by the end of this week!
 

1. Call for Acceptance of Minutes—Frank Bauer KA3HDO and Martha Muir W4MSA 

The minutes for January’s meeting were sent out by Martha to the members via email prior to today’s meeting.  Stefan made a motion to accept the minutes.  Glenn seconded that motion.  The motion passed without dissent.  The minutes will be sent to Carol Jackson to be posted on the ARISS website.
 
              Martha has given Frank and Oliver the typed minutes of the Face to Face meeting but Frank wants to annotate the minutes with the presentations and other files to that before the minutes are sent out to everyone.  Some presentation files are still outstanding from some of the meeting attendees.  Please send them to Frank directly.  Ciaran asked if folks can get them before the next meeting.  Frank replied that we need to get all the presentations first.
 
 2. Review of Face to Face meeting and the 40th Anniversary Celebration – Frank and Oliver
              Frank said that he can sum up his feeling about the whole event with a simple 3 letter word:  WOW! 
We missed those who couldn’t attend.  The activity was extremely big and we are now trying to get all the materials from it in so they can place together as final archival documentation.  Please get your presentations and photos to Frank as soon as possible.  All major ARISS-I presentations are on the Dropbox now.  Stefan asked if we can share the documents shared in the Dropbox.  Frank replied saying his answer has two parts.  ‘In my opinion, yes, though some documents may be confidential, particularly those associated with the AMSAT Italia Proposal to Gateway.  We need to ask AMSAT Italia if they are okay with sharing them. Otherwise, we need to make these files private.
Oliver gave his opinion on this.  There were two sessions:  the Face to Face meeting and the 40th Anniversary Celebration.   The F2F forum is open to those that participated – for the most part.  The Italian proposal is not ARISS.  It belongs to AMSAT Italia.  ARISS can use it but not publish it.  As far as photos are concerned there is nothing there to hide.  There were signs posted at the venue indicating that photos were being taken that may be made public. 
Given that, Will Marchant said keep proprietary rights to documents only.  Frank summed things up by saying that the Italian proposal is from AMSAT-Italy not ARISS-I.  We cannot make proprietary decisions for them.  Oliver said that we (ARISS-I) need to ask them (AMSAT-Italy) if we can publish their information. 
Stefan asked ‘how long will things be available in the Dropbox?’  Answer:  All materials from the ARISS-I meeting are archived permanently on Dropbox. 
 
3. HamTV update – Randy Berger
Randy started by saying that it was great to see everyone at the Face to Face and 40th anniversary events. 
Randy said that Thursday, March 21, SpaceX 30 is scheduled to launch with the HamTV unit onboard. ‘We are working on the documentation and updating the webpage to provide illustrative examples of HamTV ground stations.  Folks from the United Kingdom are helping with this.’  Please review and help edit this. 
 
4.  Lunar Amateur Radio Frequencies – Frank Bauer
This was brought up at the recent Face to Face meeting.  Frank said he was able to pull out the official frequency allocations.  He had a lengthy talk with Cathy Sham, Lunar and Mars spectrum lead from the Space Frequency Coordination Group (SFCG).  The frequencies to be used from the Earth to the moon are not the same as the frequencies from the moon to the Earth.  Ham radio teams developing lunar communications systems need to be aware of the restrictions in place in the Shield Zone of the Moon (SZM).  SZM restrictions were put in place by the ITU and the SFCG so as to not to affect radio astronomy observations on the far side of the moon.  The lunar Gateway resides on the far side of the moon. 
       Emanuelle said confirmed that frequencies from the Earth to the moon are not a problem.  He has questions about frequencies to be used from the moon to the Earth.  Glenn added that a lot of work was done on these frequency allocations by the ITU and the SFCG with a document that was published last June.    
 
Any Other Business
Stefan asked Sergey if anything is planned for the anniversary of Yuri Gagarin’s first flight on April 12?  Jan said there is good info on this in the chat.
Actions for delegates: 
-Randy said he is looking for comments about HamTV ground stations. 
-Frank said get the lunar frequency document, read it, and send in your comments.  There may be another meeting on this.  He also queried Emanuelle about whether there were plans to have an antenna interface meeting to develop the interface documentation. He reminded all that during the ARISS-I meeting, it was requested that this information needed to be supplied by June.  
-Oliver asked ‘who will be in charge of the next (2025) International Delegates meeting?  Let the ARISS-I officers know of any suggestions you have on this.
 
Frank thanked Irina for her interpretations today. 
The next ARISS-I monthly meeting will be on April 16, 2024.   
 
Respectfully submitted, Martha Muir, ARISS-I Secretary