Wes: I'm at 49 states on satellite and I've looked into this from FM18 and sites within the 50 mile WAS radius, Take a look at satmatch.com, and try AO-7 and RS-44 with various combinations of grids on the Big Island, maybe eastern Oahu, etc., and locations within your 50 mile WAS circle (Mt W is too far, would still be cool!) that have EXCELLENT horizons to the west (I'm checking sites along Skyline Drive in VA as my best bet). For me, there are possibilities with passes at 1-2 deg, and I may have to wait until the orbital movement puts apogee in the right spot. There is an active ham on Oahu, but he has terrain blocking the way for working low elevations to the east.
So I STRONGLY support GOLF as a return to higher orbits; it's probably cheaper than a GoFundMe to send someone with a 9700 to the Big Island for a week or 2. Definitely cheaper than a time machine to gell my younger self during the AO13 and 40 days to WORK SOMEONE IN HAWAII WHILE YOU CAN! :)
73 Steve KS1G
On Mon, Aug 10, 2020 at 2:23 PM badencapecod@gmail.com wrote:
From: Wes Baden badencapecod@gmail.com
Subject: [amsat-bb] ME to HI for WAS--Possible at present? Any ideas about the following? My QTH is in Maine, FN54, 120 feet ASL. I'm closing in on WAS, but the problem is going to be Hawaii. From my rough calculations, I need a SAT that has a 4500+ mile footprint, meaning an apogee of 1200+ miles, and even then any operating window will be pretty short. Current MEO satellites do not seem to offer a window quite that big, or am I missing something? In theory, I guess, I could go to Mt. Washington, NH (fortunately only 90 miles away) and a KH6 could go up on a volcanic peak there, to try to make use of over-the-horizon signal bending. But I'm not sure if even that would work at the present time, and in any case I can wait if a better MEO or an HEO bird is in the offing in the next few years. Does anyone know if ME-HI will be possible in the future, and if so when? WAS SAT is on my bucket list. Of course I envy all of you to the west of me, who can contact HI, but on the other hand it is nice to be only 3200 or so from London, 3800 miles from Berlin. We are all prisoners of our locations, at least until another HEO satellite is in orbit again. Thanks for feedback. And by the way, I'm always happy to sked with anyone needing FN54, not the rarest grid in ME but a challenge for many stations, especially out west or so they tell me.
73, Wes NA1ME