PARI

Hidden Treasure

When I first heard of this place, I thought Mike (N4OFA) had been in a closed room with his paint fumes for too long… An old spy-satellite station up in the mountains ? Huge radio telescope dishes ? And they let him pull cables and work on stuff ? Had to be the paint fumes. Over the years tho, I have come to learn more of the history of the old Rosman Tracking Station.
And more importantly, some of what is going on up there these days.
Visit PARI.EDU on-line to find more detail….

So – I introduced myself to PARI and some of the folks there, and have been to visit a few times. On this most recent trip I became an official volunteer, and will be helping to establish more functionality into their Information System Infrastructure management activites, and to further document the networks and the systems that support the PARI mission & operations.

Recently PARI has installed the upgraded feedboxes for both of the 26m dish antennas, and expect to be testing, calibrating, and all that other magic stuff to integrate this into a world-class interferometer. These are certainly exciting times up on the hilltop in Western North Carolina. Hidden Treasure indeed.

I’ll be back to this blog from time to time, with more pictures and stories to tell.
Thanks  /;^)

Why JNOS ??

Anyone who knows me, or has read much of my blog – recognizes I have a lingering interest in an old-school method of providing basic text-messaging.
In today’s world of instant Internet and SMS at our fingertips, it is still easy for me to remember when that was a fantasy. We felt rather state-of-the-art when we could boast of inter-continental email via satellite gateways in the late 1980s, way before most folks had even heard of the Internet. And all this was via RF, and amateur radio operators who had a vision and a passion for providing such a service well before the “When All Else Fails” phrase was coined…

To me, this simple infrastructure is

HuntsvilleHamfest2010

"The" Hamfest

As expected, this year the Huntsville Hamfest is a blast. Last year a schedule conflict resulted in the hamfest having to split the vendors and the flea-market into two areas. This year they are back together where it has been before, and everyone is much happier. It appears to be a big crowd this year, and everyone says they are having a wonderful time. I won’t go into too much detail this morning, as I need to

STS129 – Go Atlantis !

Such a beautiful day for a launch, I hope you got to watch… If not, look for the replays. I continue to be impressed every time I see one. /;^)

STS129 Mission Patch