Mission type | Amateur radio satellite |
---|---|
Operator | USAF |
COSPAR ID | 1998-064B |
SATCAT no. | 25520 |
Spacecraft properties | |
Launch mass | 57 kg (126 lb) |
Dimensions | 50 cm (20 in) |
Start of mission | |
Launch date | 30 October 1998, 17:20 UTC |
Rocket | Space Shuttle Discovery STS-95 |
Launch site | Kennedy LC-39B |
Contractor | NASA |
End of mission | |
Last contact | 2003 |
Orbital parameters | |
Reference system | Geocentric |
Regime | Low Earth |
Eccentricity | 0.00072 |
Perigee altitude | 551 km (342 mi) |
Apogee altitude | 561 km (349 mi) |
Inclination | 28.5° |
Period | 95.8 minutes |
Epoch | 30 October 1998[1] |
PANSAT (Petite Amateur Navy Satellite, also known as OSCAR 34) was an amateur radio satellite. It was launched by Space Shuttle Discovery during the STS-95 mission as part of the third International Extreme Ultraviolet Hitchhiker (IEH-3) mission, on 30 October 1998 from Kennedy Space Center, Florida.[2][3]
The satellite was built by students from the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California. It offered the possibility of packet radio transmission in BPSK or Direct-Sequence Spread Spectrum in the 70 cm band. The satellite was configured in a sphere-like shape, featuring 26 sides used for solar cell and antenna placement.[4] The spacecraft supplied direct-sequence, spread-spectrum modulation with an operating center frequency of 436.5 MHz, a bit rate of 9600 bit/s and 9 MB of message storage.