Geosynchronous satellites registered

Allen Thomson (thomsona@netcom.com)
Sun, 25 Feb 1996 06:58:39 -0800

   John Pike has posted the following message on a number of newsgroups.
It's interesting that the two "unidentified" geosynchronous satellites
found by Rainer Kracht are near the locations of US CSID-E2 and E3/E4.
(Although the message is dated 16 February, it just appeared on my
server.)

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From: John Pike <johnpike@fas.org>
Newsgroups: sci.space.policy,sci.astro.amateur,alt.politics.org.cia,alt.politics.org.nsa,rec.radio.amateur.space
Subject: GEO Orbital Locations of US SIGINT Satellites [check them out!!]
Date: 16 Feb 1996 00:29:59 GMT
Organization: Federation of American Scientists


At the 1995 World Radio Conference, the US registered the following 
satellites as operating in the 17.8-21.2 GHz downlink and 30-31 GHz 
uplink bands.

station      longitude

US CSID-A1    E 000
US CSID-A2    E 044
US CSID-A3    E 075
US CSID-A4    E 082
US CSID-A5    E 092
US CSID-A6    E 110
US CSID-E1    W 010
US CSID-E2    W 013
US CSID-E3    W 024
US CSID-E4    W 030
US CSID-W1    W 141
US CSID-W2    W 144

The US also registered

US CSID-P     non-GSO [63 degrees, 39400-1000 km, 8 satellites]


[source: WRC-95 Document 235(Rev.2)-E 14 November 1995]

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It is to be expected that geostationary SIGINT [VORTEX, MAGNUM, etc] 
birds will be found occupying some [but perhaps not all] of the 
registered orbital locations, and that the HEO registrations cover 
JUMPSEAT/TRUMPET spacecraft.

These systems have been operating at these locations since the 1970s, and 
their spectrum/orbit allocations were grandfathered to protect them from 
potential interferrence from new KA-band applicants, such as Teledesic.

These systems are associated with two ground stations, one in the 
Washington area, and the other at Castle Rock near Denver. These ground 
stations have a 200 dbi gain.

-- 
John Pike
Federation of American Scientists  http://www.fas.org/pub/gen/fas/
CyberStrategy Project              http://www.fas.org/pub/gen/fas/cp/
Intelligence Reform Project        http://www.fas.org/pub/gen/fas/irp/
Military Analysis Network          http://www.fas.org/pub/gen/fas/man/
Space Policy Project               http://www.fas.org/pub/gen/fas/spp/