AFCRL Limited War Effort Task No. 24: Satellite Beacon Studies in the Panama Canal Zone PDF Download

Author: John P. Mullen
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Artificial satellites
Languages : en
Pages : 28

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Book Description
During the period 1 December 1967 to 1 December 1970, a simulated satellite terminal was operated in the U.S. Army Tropic Test Center, Panama Canal Zone. The project has two objectives: determination of ionospheric effects at VHF and determination of foliage effects on satellite signals at very high frequencies (VHF). By far the majority of the effects observed were attributed to the former cause. Diffraction by ionospheric irregularities on specific nights caused fading of up to 16 dB peak to peak. During the day and other nights, no appreciable fading was observed. While a sample of 1000 hours taken over summer and fall of 1968 yielded a scintillation probability of occurrence of 3.15%, a smaller sample (369 hours) taken during the vernal equinox of 1970 yielded almost three times that probability. It is suggested that during the declining portion of the sunspot cycle the equatorial scintillation region moves northward. Total electron content is computed and its importance in measuring radar range error is noted. (Author).