Satgen235     Prophets without Honour   by GM4IHJ               25 Sept 
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It is often the case , that the advice of a clear thinking Prophet, is
least likely to be taken by his own countrymen. Equally where anyone
applies the word "Amateur" to their activities, it matters not that they
may have excellent professional qualifications and experience. However
exciting the results of their activities, they will be actively ignored by
the "professionals". Some of this is our own fault. We put out magazines
which portray ionospheres 3000 kms high , and talk about the 23cm solar
flux affecting HF propagation. All of which gives the professionals a good
laugh. but, now and again , professional "Not Invented Here" can be very
counter productive.
A case in point began in 1958, when W8JK (Dr John Kraus director of Ohio
State University Radio Observatory), noticed that terrestrial beacon
signals were enhanced when low altitude satellites passed by. W3PK (Perry
Klein) and W2RS (Ray Soifer) carried out experiments to see whether they
could communicate via these short lived ion trails which the satellites
were generating. They proved they could communicate. But the significance
of the fact that these ion trails were being generated not by any rocket
but by the hardware of the satellite as it bashed into the solar wind, was
ignored to their cost by the professional community until the early 1990s.
At which point the professionals were forced to change their tune , but
gave no credit to the original discoverers.
One flop occured in the July/Aug 85 Challenger mission, when a Very Low
Frequency receiver was released by Challenger to monitor the "natural VLF
noises of space". NASA and other ground observers listed to a 400 MHz FM
downlink which replayed these natural ? noises, and were delighted to hear
a chorus of cheeps and whistles. Unfortunately it later became obvious
that this natural ? VHF noise was being generated by ions released by
Shuttle itself. So that experiment was quietly forgotten. However there
being no rest for the wicked. It slowly became clear that lots of Shuttle
experiments were being polluted by ions released from Shuttle itself.
Indeed the front end of the Shuttle positively glows as it pushes its way
into the solar wind. Thereby causing aurora like dischages which make
observations at X ray, Infra Red and other experiments, impossible from
the Shuttle cargo bay. Hence the shift of NASA experiments of late, out of
the cargo bay onto free flying pallets left well clear of Shuttle.
Is this the end of the story ? No such luck.Several Radio Amateur groups
have recently proposed to include VLF experiment in their low altitude
satellite packages. Sorry chaps, but you really should listen to what your
fellow amateur said a long time ago.If you want to record "Space VLF" , do
so, far out from Earth - Eg out where Voyager 1 and 2 are operating beyond
Pluto, and where these two craft have recently reported the collision of
the tremendous solar flares which left the Sun in May/June 91 , and have
just arrived out where the Solar Wind collides with the Galactic Wind at
what is called the Heliopause boundary. Both craft have been reporting
strong bursts of 1.8 to 3.5 KHz noise from this collision and it is now
realised that ,a similar event heard by Voyager in Feb 85 was caused by an
earlier solar burst in 1983, and that both bursts coincided with decreases
in cosmic ray activity ( known as Forbush decreases) where the tangled
magnetic fields following in the turbulent trail of these bursts
temporarily impedes cosmic ray egress into the solar system. 73 de John
GM4IHJ @ GB7SAN