On March 24, two more satellites were yeeted from the Japanese Small Satellite Orbital Deployer aboard the ISS. The first nanosatellite was KITSUNE, the first 6U, or 10 by 20 by 30 centimeters, CubeSat deployed using the J-SSOD. It has a camera capable of taking five-meter resolution images. KITSUNE also includes an amateur radio payload that will transmit a Morse code beacon that will describe the status of various systems on the satellite. It will also be used to demonstrate high rate data communications in the C-band, something not typically done on an amateur radio satellite.

The other satellite yote into space was called IHI-Sat. It is much smaller than KITSUNE, being only 3U, or 30 by 10 by 10 centimeters in size. Its purpose is to track ships at sea using the Automatic Identification System carried on most commercial ships. Knowing the position and speed of ships helps avoid collisions and can aid rescuers in the event of an emergency. The sensor on IHI-Sat improves on previous ones by being able to identify many more ships in crowded areas.

More Information

PDF: KITSUNE Armature CW Information (Kyushu Institute of Technology)

Yeet video