The average daily sunspot numbers this week were about the same as last week, while the average daily solar flux declined a little more than eight points to 128.9. Geomagnetic indicators were quiet. The average daily sunspot numbers of 95.3 for the week is considerably below the average for the previous 90 days, which was 120.8. Sunspot numbers for December 15-21 were 44, 60, 95, 103, 133, 139 and 93, with a mean of 95.3. The 10.7 cm flux was 124.2, 121, 119.6, 127.4, 128.2, 137.4 and 144.5, with a mean of 128.9. The estimated planetary A indices were 0, 0, 0, 1, 4, 3 and 3, with a mean of 1.6. The estimated mid-latitude A indices were 2, 2, 2, 3, 6, 5 and 5, with a mean of 3.6.
The solar flux has been climbing over the past week, after a low of 119.6 on December 17. The predicted flux values for the near term are 145 on December 23, 140 on December 24-27, 145 on December 28-30, then dropping suddenly to 120 on December 31-January 2, 125 on January 3-4, 128 on January 5-8, and then peaking at 130 on January 9-17. The predicted planetary A index is 5 on December 23 through January 4, 8 on January 5-6, and 5 on January 7-21. This is from NOAA and the U.S. Air Force Space Weather Operations. There is another opinion, of course: Geophysical Institute Prague predicts quiet conditions December 23, quiet to unsettled December 24, active conditions December 25, unsettled to active December 26, quiet to unsettled December 27 and quiet again on December 28-29.
Active conditions are quite different from an A index of 5, although the NOAA/USAF outlook is at least eight hours newer than the Prague prediction. But looking back 24 hours earlier to the December 21 prediction, USAF/NOAA has nothing different on December 25, although they do show an A index of 8 on December 29. You can check here for the latest prediction, which is updated daily after 2100.
The News
ARISSat-1 Re-enters Earth's Atmosphere
Loyd C. Headrick Published Date Hits: 63
According to the AMSAT News Service, the ARISSat-1 satellite has re-entered Earth’s atmosphere. Reception reports indicate that ARISSat-1 stopped transmitting Wednesday morning, January 4, and was destroyed soon after.
The last telemetry reports indicated that the internal temperature had topped 167 degrees Fahrenheit and was rising rapidly. Konstantin, RN3ZF, sent a reception report of a pass at 0842 UTC and stated, "The telemetry was absent, voice messages were not legible, very silent and interrupted. Most likely, I saw the last minutes in the life of the satellite."
ARISSat-1/KEDR was deployed from the International Space Station on August 3, 2011 during EVA-29 on by Cosmonaut/Flight Engineers Sergei Volkov and Alexander Samokutyaev. The satellite carried a student experiment from Kursk State University in Russia that measured atmospheric density. Students from around the world provided the voices for the FM voice announcements.
ARISSat-1 achieved several "firsts" for Amateur Radio in space:
-First flight test of the AMSAT Software Defined Transponder, which included an FM voice downlink cycling between student messages, spoken telemetry and SSTV; a 16 kHz bandwidth linear transponder; a CW beacon carrying telemetry and call signs of radio amateurs (noting their significant contributions to amateur radio in space) and a robust, forward-error-corrected 1kbps BPSK digital downlink carrying satellite telemetry and Kursk experiment telemetry.
-Development and release of the ARISSatTLM software for PC and Mac platforms to allow amateur stations worldwide to enjoy reliable reception of the BPSK and CW telemetry.
-A new Integrated Housekeeping Unit design.
-A new Power Management System design.
Our thanks to the AMSAT News Service for the information used in this story.