 |
| Image courtesy NASA. |
People use satellites to watch T.V., make long-distance phone calls, use fax machines and pagers, and listen to the radio. Communication satellites transmit television, telephone, internet, and radio signals all over the world. They are used for rural and wireless communication, news and data dissemination, emergency communications, disaster warnings, search and rescue, telemedicine, and remote education.
In 1962, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) launched the first telephone and television satellite, AT&T’s Telstar 1. Telstar was the first satellite to transmit black-and-white as well as color television between two continents (Europe and America). It was capable of transmitting 600 telephone channels or one television channel. Today, satellites can carry over 24,500 voice channels, and 400 television channels.
 |
Click on thumbnail (above) to view full-sized image.
Image courtesy Sirius. |
Satellite radio offers listeners over 100 channels of music, talk, and news beamed from 22,000 miles in space with complete clarity. In 1997, the FCC granted licenses to Sirius and XM to develop and broadcast digital radio programming nationwide via satellite. A Sirius satellite radio like the one below offers listeners a wide variety of music, from hip-hop to classical to bluegrass, as well as news and sports. The programming is beamed from New York to one of three Sirius satellites, which then transmits the signal to the radio receiver.
|
