At 11:34 PM 11/23/2009, Jan-Albert Koekemoer wrote:

In an effort to make this as painless as possible, I would like to request comments on the possible use of regional coordinators, which I believe worked quite well for SO-35. Such coordinators would then be responsible for setting up schedules in advance for their specific regions, taking into account obviously the pool of possible satellite passes, as well as local events / fairs etc. We would then simply load the schedules on a weekly basis.

I was the VK/ZL coordinator for SO-35, and drew up the schedule for the region for over a year. If I recall correctly, I was the first of several regional coordinators.

The arrangement worked well, and I formed a close working relationship with the SO-35 team. The work wasn't particularly difficult, and having local knowledge, I could tweak the passes to suit the needs of the local satellite community. I also helped the SO-35 team test different transponder configurations (some worked better than others), by offering feedback about how well the different configurations worked, using my setup of known performance.

Based on my experience, I would recommend and encourage the use of regional coordinators. It's not a particularly difficult job, it takes the load off the satellite operators, and it provides a local point of contact for satellite users to request passes for special events, or to cover areas that were missed out.

73 de VK3JED / VK3IRL http://vkradio.com