Four new amateur radio "cubesats" were deployed on
October 4 from the International Space Station. As has been the case for
virtually all recent cubesats operating in the amateur bands, they are
downlink-only satellites and most have scientific missions not directly related
to amateur radio. The ARRL reports that the four satellites deployed in October
were TechEdSat, a collaboration between NASA, Japan's and Sweden's space
agencies and San Jose State University in California; FITSAT-1, built by
university students in Japan, WE-WISH, built by Japan's Meisei Electric Company
Radio Club and transmitting CW telemetry and slow-scan TV images; and F-1,
built by university students in Hanoi, Vietnam. As of press time, signals had
been monitored from all the satellites except F-1.
