Session
Weekend Session 6: Coordinating Successful Educational Programs
Location
Utah State University, Logan, UT
Abstract
This paper documents the team's process for finding the Thomas Jefferson Research and Education Vehicle for Radio Broadcasts (TJREVERB) with the help of the Amateur Radio community. The team attempted contacting the primary Iridium radio on TJREVERB for one week after it was deployed from the International Space Station but failed. The satellite did switch to its secondary radio, a SATT 4 APRS. However, the team was inexperienced and unprepared to contact the satellite using the SATT 4 APRS. Since we do not have access to an APRS ground station, we leveraged the help of twenty amateur radio volunteers from all around the world to contact TJREVERB. Additionally, many more amateur radio operators contributed their expertise and recorded sightings of TJREVERB using resources such as SatNog's satellite database. This global network of volunteers cooperated to position their respective stations for the best possible chance of contact. This paper discusses how the Amateur Radio community's involvement is invaluable to the students' small satellite education. It also discusses the training program developed due to this experience. The lessons learned about satellite contacts and operations are critically important for future educational satellite teams and will contribute to their success.
Finding TJREVERB: A Crowdsourced Effort to Find a High School CubeSat
Utah State University, Logan, UT
This paper documents the team's process for finding the Thomas Jefferson Research and Education Vehicle for Radio Broadcasts (TJREVERB) with the help of the Amateur Radio community. The team attempted contacting the primary Iridium radio on TJREVERB for one week after it was deployed from the International Space Station but failed. The satellite did switch to its secondary radio, a SATT 4 APRS. However, the team was inexperienced and unprepared to contact the satellite using the SATT 4 APRS. Since we do not have access to an APRS ground station, we leveraged the help of twenty amateur radio volunteers from all around the world to contact TJREVERB. Additionally, many more amateur radio operators contributed their expertise and recorded sightings of TJREVERB using resources such as SatNog's satellite database. This global network of volunteers cooperated to position their respective stations for the best possible chance of contact. This paper discusses how the Amateur Radio community's involvement is invaluable to the students' small satellite education. It also discusses the training program developed due to this experience. The lessons learned about satellite contacts and operations are critically important for future educational satellite teams and will contribute to their success.
