ISS Expedition 72 Series 23

Received Images – Expedition: 72 Series: 23 (2024 Highlights)

ISS

For more information about the ARISS Project see their website.

The International Space Station (ISS) orbits the earth at an altitude of approximately 400 km at speeds that literally defy gravity. At 28,800 km/h (8,000 m/s) it takes only 92 minutes for the weightless laboratory to make a complete circuit of Earth. Astronauts working and living on the Station experience 16 sunrises and sunsets each day.

Due to the Station’s orbit it appears to travel from west to east over our planet, and due to Earth’s own rotation the Space Station moves 2,200 km to the west on each orbit. You can see the Space Station with your own eyes from Earth by looking up at the right time, this is usually at night when the ISS is illuminated by reflected sunlight.

The ISS is the result of collaboration between a number of nations and space agencies including NASA, ESA, CSA, JAXA, ROSCOSMOS and others. Many activities and investigations are undertaken on the ISS including, from time to time, Amateur Radio operations. The ISS is equipped with a cross-band repeater, an APRS gateway and other Amateur Radio equipment which is used, amongst other things, to allow regular school contacts between pupils and the astronauts on the ISS. These contacts were popularised by British astronaut Tim Peak when he participated in the Principia mission named after Isaac Newtons Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica (Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy).

ARISS made 111 STEM contacts in 2024 bringing the total number of STEM contacts to 1700 since the programme was created.

There have been a number of SSTV activity periods since I published my results from Expedition 66 Series 19 (Lunar Exploration) at the end of 2021/beginning of 2022. The intervening Series (excluding MAI short “sprint” events) were:

Expedition 72 Series 22 – 40th Anniversary of Amateur Radio on Human Spaceflight
Expedition 72 Series 21 – SSTV Experiment
Expedition 67 Series 20 – Women in Space

If you want to see images from any of these ARISS Events or other transmissions they can be found at the ARISS Gallery, where you can select the event of choice from the “drop-down” at the top of the page.

Certificate for reception of SSTV images from Expedition 72 Series 21

This particular event took place over the Christmas/New Year period 2024/25, the details of the event were announced by ARISS via their Social Media Channels (@arissintl.bsky.social), in summary the parameters were:

On the ISS: Service Module Radio
Frequency: 145.800MHz FM (expect +/- 3kHz Doppler shift)
SSTV Mode: PD120
Theme: Celebrating ARISS 2024
Images in Series: 12
Timing:

Start: no earlier than 14:55 UTC on 25/12/2024
End: around 14:20 UTC on 05/01/2025

Transmission Breaks:

None

As it transpired there were a couple of transmission breaks but these were unplanned and quickly rectified by the ARISS teams.

Most of the passes over my QTH in IO81ok were in the small hours of the morning which was challenging for manual reception, nevertheless I did stay up and venture out into the cold for a number of the orbital passes. My receiving station comprised a relatively low key setup as follows:

Antenna: Either a quarter wavelength vertical or a Sharman SG7900 mobile whip. In both cases the antenna was set up on the car no more than 1.6m – 1.7m above the ground.
Receiver: SDR Play RSP 1A
SDR Software: SDR Play SDR Connect
Audio Routing: QJackCtrl
Image Decoding: QSSTV
Computer: ASUS Strix laptop
Operating System: Pop!_OS by System 76