from amsat-uk
the mission control centre at sstl at the surrey space centre reports
that uosat-oscar-14 has finally reached the end of its mission after
nearly 14 years in orbit. launched on 22 january 1990 by ariane, uo-14
was the first 9k6 bps amateur data communications satellite and
pioneered the pacsat communications concept. after approximately 18
months in orbit, uo-14 was switched to 'commercial frequencies' for
humanitarian use for satellife and it was used by them until 1997 when
it was switched back to amateur use as an fm repeater where it remained
until now. since launch, uo-14 has completed over 72,000 orbits and as
many charge/discharge cycles of its on-board nicd battery, however
recently one of the battery cells has become exhausted and can no longer
support continuous operation of the repeater (the transmitter shuts down
shortly after it is commanded on due to undervoltage) so the
microsatellite's mission has been terminated. thank you uo-14 for your
long service!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
professor sir martin sweeting obe frs g3yjo
chairman, amsat-uk
73
richard w l limebear g3rwl
g3rwl@amsat.orgfoc # 1188
sent via
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