Looking up: French radio enthusiast captures ISS signals from his garage
On his identity card, he is Vincent Plousey. On the airwaves, he goes by "F0GXR" – spelled out as "Foxtrot, Zero, Golf, X-ray, Romeo" in the international radio alphabet, a callsign he also wears stitched on to his cap.
Plousey has been roaming the radio waves since he was 10 years old. It began with his father's radio set, which could pick up shortwave signals carrying foreign stations.
"By turning the dials, I came across Radio Moscow, Voice of America, Vatican Radio, RFI," he said. "It was an immediate shock, because from my suburb of Paris, I had access to the whole world."
This fascination grew into a lasting passion for amateur radio.
In 2024, France had 15,000 radio amateurs and 400 active radio clubs, according to the National Frequency Agency (ANFR), the French regulator that issues licences once applicants pass a mandatory exam.
Plousey got his in 2012.
'Real moment of happiness'
Since then, the 50-something astro-enthusiast has broadened his horizons.
No longer content just to listen to radio stations from around this planet, he tracks down signals arriving from space – particularly from satellites.
In April 2026, standing outside his garage with an aerial and a receiver, Plousey managed to pick up an exchange between the French astronaut Sophie Adenot and school pupils on Earth, as the International Space Station (ISS) passed over France.
"At the start, there's always a moment of nerves because of the connection delay," he explains. "The real moment of happiness is when you hear it perfectly."
Plousey stressed just how simple making contact can be: "With a simple receiver and a telescopic aerial, you can pick up the station in two minutes, and that's brilliant." Plousey assembles an antenna made out of a sweet tin lid and a cardboard tube.
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Joys of DIY
Back in his garage, he continues to build his own equipment.
"Amateur radio is all about tinkering," he says, while assembling a homemade aerial built from the lid from a tin of sweets and the cardboard tube from a roll of fabric.
He believes the value of amateur radio lies precisely in how accessible a hobby it is – no need for sophisticated NASA-type equipment, even to pick up satellites much further away than the ISS.
After the ISS, which orbits 400 kilometres above Earth, he moved on to connect with a geostationary maritime satellite, 36,000 kilometres from our planet.
To prove this s possible even with the most basic equipment, he uses a tin can as a satellite dish.
"They have the right size and diameter to pick up the one gigahertz frequencies given off by this type of satellite," he says. "Making your own aerials is also what interests radio hams."
Plousey's day job as a school catering assistant comes in handy for collecting enough tin cans to turn into satellite dishes.
Using copper wire, he attaches a can to the tripod of an astronomical telescope pointed towards the geostationary satellite. Several cables connect the whole set-up to software installed on his computer.
After a few minutes of adjustments and tweaks to the set-up, the first signals appear on the spectrum analyser.
"You can see vertical lines typical of satellite data transmissions," he says pointing to the screen. Plousey works in school catering – very handy for collecting tins to turn into satellite dishes.
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Inspiring young people
Capturing ever more distant satellites and testing himself against other radio hams is what continues to motivate Plousey, years after he started out in amateur radio.
But he admits that in an increasingly digital age, and with his hobby remaining largely male-dominated and most popular among people of a certain age, it's difficult to interest younger people in radio waves.
Still, he believes there's a case worth making.
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"Young people say they care about environmental issues. We're modern in that respect – I recycle by giving my tin cans a second life. That should appeal to them," he says.
"We have a duty to tell these young people, whether from cities or the countryside, that even if they haven't done advanced studies, as is my case, they can still carry out wonderful technical and technological experiments with an amateur radio licence."
Plousey's hobby could keep him busy for many years to come. His next challenge is to capture signals from Haven-1, the first private space station, due to enter orbit in early 2027.
This article has been adapted from the original version in French by Baptiste Coulon.
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