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How to Survive an Earthquake – The Triangle of Life

January 6, 2012 by 1 Comment

Every year there are hundreds, if not thousands of earthquakes but the only ones to make the headlines are those that impact significantly on us humans. 2011 was a bad year for such events – I don’t need to name them as they will all flash into your mind as you read this.

For a while now I’ve been composing a blog post with the provisional title “The Ultimate Seismograph – How to Survive an Earthquake”. It describes an earthquake I was in and the very unique situation that transpired. While putting the finishing touches to it I realised that “How to Survive an Earthquake” demanded a separate blog post of its own, so here it is. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Links, People, Places

Watch the VLA Antennas Dance

December 9, 2011 by Leave a Comment

TimeScapes 4K from Tom Lowe on Vimeo.

When I saw this short time-lapse video I was just blown away! Twenty seven 25 metre antennas of the Very Large Array (VLA) in New Mexico dancing in unison – and to music.

Thanks so much to Brigitte Bailleul (@Brigitte_Ba on Twitter) [Read more…]

Filed Under: Places, Radio Astronomy, Space

LA Confidential – X-Band & Artichokes

October 28, 2011 by Leave a Comment
The Westin Bonaventure Hotel, Los Angeles

The Westin Bonaventure Hotel

I’m the sort of person who likes to plan, but despite my best intentions life always seems to be event-driven. Such is the case today, which is why I’m writing this. Let me explain:

I’m on LinkedIn and am a member of some 30+ Groups relating to satellite communications. Being a helpful sort of guy I try to answer questions posed by Group members if they relate to a topic that I know something about. Such was the case today when I saw that someone had posed the question along the lines “What is the difference between the use of a Klystron and a TWTA in an earth station transmitter”?
Well, that’s right up my street. I remembered writing a paper related to this way back in 1981. Even though that was 30 years ago and technology evolves, the underlying physics remains the same.

The paper was entitled “Design of a High Power Earth Station Transmitter for the Band 7.9 to 8.4 GHz”. As you’ll all know that is one of the main uplink bands (X-Band) used for military satellite communications and the paper arose out of some work I did on a contract for a particular Government [Read more…]

Filed Under: Cities, Launch Sites, Launch Vehicles, Military Earth Stations