Upcoming ISS SSTV Transmissions Feb 2022

Hi All,

Hope you're keeping well and enjoying your radio.  


I wrote a little while back about Slow Scan Television, (SSTV), transmissions from the International Space Station, (ISS). Link as follows :-

ISS SSTV

There is due to be some more transmissions from the Russian module over the next couple of days :-

http://ariss-sstv.blogspot.com/2022/02/moscow-aviation-institute-sstv.html


I've not had much luck with decoding full images due to local interference but the best part of even the failed experiences was getting one of my grand children involved. She enthusiastically sat with me fascinated by the squeals and trills coming through the speakers of my ancient Yaesu FT290r and at a later date armed with a simple Baofeng UV5r in the garden.

Now, this was not without other context. 
I had previously sat with her armed with a tablet showing images of the International Space Station and living in a matriarchal household, (Wife, two daughters, five granddaughters, one grandson!), we had concentrated on female astronauts. This was the hook because despite sexist attitudes being slowly eroded she couldn't believe a 'lady' would be in space.....God knows what they teach them in schools?!?

Unfortunately another older granddaughter couldn't avert her eyes for a moment from Tik-Tok, Roblox and other mobile phone activities.  (The emoji shows the look I often get!) The others preoccupied with childhood activities and the grandson bouncing of the walls exploring his 'masculine' abilities. That seems to be his preoccupation since starting school and mixing with other 'boys'.

But for one granddaughter normally buried in a world of unicorns, rainbows and computer animated films it opened her eyes to other possibilities, a 'make-believe' that could or does actually happen. That can't be a bad thing.


Amazing things happen with our 'old technology' of radio, youngsters forgetting Bluetooth, 4G, Wi-Fi etc. is also actually radio.



If you want to give the ISS a try you'd best think about doing over the next few years because it won't be long before it gracefully retires as a fireball in the sky......

https://www.space.com/how-to-destroy-a-space-station-safely


All the best,
Victor

Victor

I did indeed spend some time on two of the passes over decoding the sstv signals from the ISS.  with moderate success very grainy pictures with interference.  however, the next time it announces the ISS will be operating SSTV then i am going to digitally record the signals and then decode them at my leisure.  Hopefully this will make for better pictures as i can then process the noise out of the transmission, it was very noisy on that frequency at my location.  I will let you know how i get on. Andy 108ct1529

Hi Andy,

Great to hear that you tried decoding the ISS SSTV signals.  

Like you my previous attempts have been fraught with interference problems. It doesn't help that I'm almost sat on top of my local 2m repeater which spits out at 145.7875MHz!!

Not that I should complain as it's my only radio link at the moment after losing all my loft antennas due to roof repairs and re-tiling. Had everything from 80m to 70cm up there and all totally trashed, wouldn't mind but I installed most of it before becoming disabled and later additions were thanks to volunteers. 'Gutted' would be an understatement!



Anyway, well done and I think your recording idea is great. Please do let us know how you get on as it would be good to hear and any decoded images posted up would be awesome.

All the best,
Victor