(Press Release) — For the past three days and intermittently before that, Ethiopian Satellite Service (ESAT) broadcasts in Ethiopia have been interrupted due to undetermined electronic interference.
Following preliminary investigations, we have confirmed the following facts:
Our service providers have performed extensive technical tests and determined that ESAT transmissions have been targeted for multiple interference from unknown sources.
Once the interference was detected, our service providers made appropriate adjustments to overcome the interfering signal. That effort worked temporarily and ESAT was back on the air. In the last 72 hours, the interfering signal was boosted jamming ESAT signals once again.
Our service providers have performed additional tests and determined that the multiple interference is targeted only at ESAT broadcasts and none of their other broadcasts.
Our service providers are continuing their investigations of the
interference and seeking appropriate solutions.
ESAT asks its viewers and supporters to continue their support of the service. ESAT management wishes to assure its viewers and supporters that it will pursue its commitment to meet its mission objectives.
ESAT Management
Contact: Abebe Belew at abelewd@yahoo.com
FORUM | 10 Comments
The Swiss company of the Satellite should sue Meles regime for jamming the broadcast. I am sure Meles regime has received all these sophisticated items from China to jam ESAT. We should also focus on China in protesting not to support Meles regime like the West although, the Chinese government is more rogue and have no human value as well. That is why it is scary if the Chinese ever becomes superpower or leader of the world, the world is doomed because they don’t have a system of democracy like the West where people can be accountable for their actions. Imagine, Chinese friends then can get away with any crime and China will not do anything about it. That is what I am not looking forward to China becoming leader of the world. After all, it was the Chinese that gave Meles regime a device to monitor the internet in Ethiopia.
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May 30th, 2010 at 12:11 PM
What do you expect ? woyane will fight tooth and nail to suppress this transmission. There will be no reason to disrupt this transmission other than woyane!! but we will see who succeeds.
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May 30th, 2010 at 12:49 PM
Jamming
Due to the low received signal strength of satellite transmissions they are prone to jamming by land-based transmitters. Such jamming is limited to the geographical area within the transmitter’s range. GPS satellites are potential targets for jamming,[38][39] but satellite phone and television signals have also been subjected to jamming.[40][41] It is trivial to transmit a carrier to a geostationary satellite and thus interfere with any other users of the transponder. It is common on commercial satellite space for earth stations to transmit at the wrong time or on the wrong frequency and dual illuminate the transponder rendering the frequency unusable. Satellite operators now have sophisticated monitoring that enables them to pin point the source of any carrier and manage the transponder space effectively.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satellite
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May 30th, 2010 at 2:04 PM
Thank you to all of you who have stood for a free flow of information. Benefits of free flow of information outweighs every thing else because this is information age. All should benefit from what this free flow of information provides. Obstruction weather it is through signal distortion jamming or whatever may be not beneficial to users of this information highway the internet, satellite, radio signals. I like VOA. I liked VOA during HS, Mengistu, and I like it now. It is diverse, decent, good and balanced. Please do not jam VOA, DV, ESAT, ErthiopianReview, EthioMedia, and other decent media. Don’t starve people of information and prosperity that come with it. Thank you.
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May 30th, 2010 at 2:32 PM
why not we stop the woyane TV in Washington and metropolitan area as a reciprocity ?
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May 30th, 2010 at 4:05 PM
Wait till TPLF gets billions of dollars from IMF and WORLD BANK so it can buy the latest technology to blow up satellites. China will only be happy to share that technology :):)
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May 30th, 2010 at 4:08 PM
If the Jaming is consistent and unable to resoolve it, it is better to ask the Eritrean Gov’t to give airtime to transmit ESAT through their television
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May 30th, 2010 at 4:35 PM
Technically if you know the uplink frequency you could jam satellite TV, a satelite normally is a repeater in space, the information is transmitted to the satelite on the so called uplink, then converted and transmitted on the downlink, the antennas for the uplink and downlink have different characteristics , the downlink antennas are designed to cover a wide area while the uplink antennas are more narrow, Uplink and downlink operate in different frequencies to avoid interference.
Now if you send a signal on the uplink that is stronger than the original signal then it will interfere with the other signal, this is a effect called blocking, basically the receiver sensitivity degrades in the presence of a strong signal.
But in order to do so you need a strong signal as well as the location of the satellite, its a very costly effort
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May 30th, 2010 at 11:22 PM
Jamming
Very shameful acts of TPLF/Woyane/Legesse/Bereket. But this will make the people even stronger to search information. We never give up in every aspect, Thanks to ESAT and VOA.
You China citizen in Ethiopia should tell your government not to participate in any act that hurt Ethiopian people. If not we are in a bloody mode that we will take any measure up on you. YES, we can do that, because you Chinas are every where, in the village in the bar on the road etc. We Ethiopian are now starving of our freedom.
God Bless Ethiopia and its innocent people.
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June 2nd, 2010 at 7:32 AM
What goes around comes around. Ethiopian government TV services – ETV’s satellite broadcast is also jammed and it is no longer possible to receive the signal. Somebody is serving TPLF a taste of its own medicine
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June 2nd, 2010 at 11:12 PM