Wednesday, November 10, Pete MI3EPN reported that he heard what sounded like FM transmissions on the lower end of the HO-68 / XW-1 linear transponder and it didn’t sound like ham radio operators making contact over a satellite. It was an interesting coincidence because I could remember that I have seen some FM-like signals while I was recording HO-68 on Tuesday evening but I thought it was some local interference.
We have a lot of crap transmitting on the 70cm band and with a 7.5 meter dish we pick up a lot of noise during low elevation passes. I decided to replay the recordings focusing on FM demodulation in the lower end of the passband and indeed I could identify the FM transmissions. In the beginning it sounds like something French though very weak, while the second half is Russian. The pass was North-East from us which explains why the Russian station was so loud. Anybody speaking Russian who can translate?
Watch video on YouTube.