ARISS News Release No. 21-26
Dave Jordan, AA4KN
ARISS PR
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
ARISS Contact is Scheduled for Students
at Green Bank Elementary Middle School, Green Bank, West Virginia, USA
May 5, 2021—Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) has received schedule confirmation for an ARISS radio contact with astronauts. ARISS is the group that puts together special amateur radio contacts between students around the globe and crew members with ham radio licenses on the International Space Station (ISS).
This will be a direct contact via amateur radio between students at the Green Bank Elementary Middle School, WV and Astronaut Mark Vande Hei, amateur radio call sign KG5GNP. Students will take turns asking their questions. English is the language that will be used for this contact. Both onsite and remote access will be provided to the student body at the time of the contact per Covid-19 guidelines. The downlink frequency for this contact is 145.800 MHZ and may be heard by listeners who are within the ISS-footprint that also encompasses the radio relay ground station.
Amateur radio operators, using the call sign N8RV, will operate the ham radio ground station for this contact.
The ARISS radio contact is scheduled for May 7, 2021 at 8:35 am EDT (Green Bank, WV), 12:35 UTC, 7:35 am CDT, 6:35 am MDT and 5:35 am PDT).
Green Bank Elementary Middle School (GBEMS) (281 students in grades k-8) is located in rural Pocahontas County, West Virginia, and will host this ARISS contact. Another 350 students in the Pocahontas County High School will also attend the ARISS contact event (in-person and remotely). GBEMS’s STEM classroom curricula are augmented with student club activities that include engineering, computer coding, and robotics. In preparation for the ARISS contact, the school’s science curriculum added courses in electronics, wave physics, and communications theory. These classroom studies and lab activities include the topics: orbital mechanics, Doppler effects, signal tracking, sky and land coordinates, and signal processing. Student courses also highlight the ISS as an example of international cooperation for a common goal and integrated this aspect into the social studies curriculum covering the course topics: distributed project participation, agreements and treaties, and organizational structure. In advance of the ARISS contact, the GBEMS Ham Club was formed for 6th through 8th graders. Members of the Eight Rivers Amateur Radio Club (ERARC) will provide equipment, technical, and operational support for the ARISS contact, and ham radio mentoring and support for the school ham club. The school has also partnered with the Green Bank Observatory (GBO), an adjacent NSF research facility, which provides educational and staff support to the school. GBO staff are also founding members of the school ham club and, along with ERARC members, conduct curriculum-supporting youth activities. These include antenna-building, radio direction-finding, and a high-altitude balloon launch and tracking. Because GBEMS is located within the West Virginia Radio Astronomy Zone, radio transmissions by the school’s ham club members must be coordinated with the GBO per FCC requirements through an agreement between the school and the National Radio Quiet Zone office.
The public is invited to watch the live stream at: https://www.facebook.com/GreenBankObservatory/live/ and https://us02web.zoom.us/j/87052256434?pwd=dUYxeFJVMFFvaHBWNnRMOG10TTZ5dz09.
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As time allows, students will ask these questions:
1. What made you decide to become an astronaut?
2. Is the ISS heated or do you wear bulky suits because it is always cold?
3. How often do you have to replenish the Oxygen tanks from earth?
4. Have you ever lost contact with The Base? What are you supposed to do if that were to happen?
5. What can you see from the Space Station that you can’t see from Earth? Other space craft, monuments, Earth patterns, stars?
6. If you have any downtime, what do you do with it? (e.g., hobbies, past times, fun).
7. What are you allowed to bring to the ISS and what did you choose to bring?
8. How do you solve problems with each other if you get into arguments?
9. Does your food go to the top of your mouth when you eat because of microgravity? Does it feel different to eat or drink in space?
10. What do you do about trash?
11. Is it possible for an animal to be pregnant in space?
12. Has there ever been a critical failure? What protocols do you have in case there is a critical failure, and do you have to do drills or practice what to do if that happens?
13. What are the emotional challenges in space?
14. How is your sleep or work schedule different in space than it would be on Earth?
15. How do you get news from Earth? Were you worried about COVID affecting your support system on the ground?
ARISS – Celebrating 20 Years of Continuous Amateur Radio Operations on the ISS
About ARISS:
Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) is a cooperative venture of international amateur radio societies and the space agencies that support the International Space Station (ISS). In the United States, sponsors are the Radio Amateur Satellite Corporation (AMSAT), the American Radio Relay League (ARRL), the ISS National Lab-Space Station Explorers, and NASA’s Space Communications and Navigation program. The primary goal of ARISS is to promote exploration of science, technology, engineering, the arts, and mathematics topics. ARISS does this by organizing scheduled contacts via amateur radio between crew members aboard the ISS and students. Before and during these radio contacts, students, educators, parents, and communities take part in hands-on learning activities tied to space, space technologies, and amateur radio. For more information, see www.ariss.org
Media Contact:
Dave Jordan, AA4KN
ARISS PR
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