ARISS News Release                                                                                                    No.23-25

Dave Jordan, AA4KN

ARISS PR

aa4kn@amsat.org

FORIMMEDIATE RELEASE

ARISSContact is Scheduled with Children at

The Children’s Inn at NIH (National Institutes of Health), Bethesda, Maryland, USA

May23, 2023—Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) has receivedschedule confirmation for an ARISS radio contact between an Axiom Mission(Ax-2) astronaut aboard the International Space Station (ISS) and children atthe Children’s Inn at NIH located in Bethesda, MD.  ARISS conducts 60-80 of these special amateurradio contacts each year between students around the globe and crew memberswith ham radio licenses aboard the ISS.

This will be atelebridge Contact via AmateurRadio allowing students toask their questions of Astronaut John Shoffner, amateur radio call sign KO4MJC.Shoffner is a STEM advocate, businesspioneer, and life-long space enthusiast, John Shoffner will serve as pilot forAxiom Space’s Ax-2 mission to the International Space Station (ISS) on theSpaceX Dragon. Shoffner currently lives in Knoxville, Tennessee, and is honoredto have this opportunity to not only achieve one of his greatest life’s dreamsbut also to use the Ax-2 mission to ignite a passion for STEM education in teachersand students worldwide to each pursue their ambitions.

The downlink frequency for this contact is145.800 MHZ and may be heard by listeners that are within the ISS-footprintthat also encompasses the telebridge station[SM1] .

The ARISS amateur radio ground station(telebridge station) for this contact is in Aartselaar, Belgium. The amateurradio volunteer team at the ground station will use the callsign ON4ISS, toestablish and maintain the ISS connection.

TheARISS radio contact is scheduled for May 26, 2023 at 1:31:38 pm EDT (MD) (17:31:38UTC, 12:31 pm CDT, 11:31 am MDT, 10:31 am PDT).

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Astime allows, students will ask these questions:

1. What do you do to keep the food that youeat from going bad?

2. Before our solar system consisted of 9planets. Why are we now discounting Pluto as a planet in our solar system?

3. What type of materials have you used whileexperimenting during your mission?

4. Has ISS discovered anything about life,vegetation, or water in its studies throughout the years?

5. What would happen if the magnetosphere thatprotects Earth stopped working?

6. What is your favorite part about being anastronaut?

7. How much training do you need to have inorder to prepare for a space launch?

8. How does time feel in space? Does it affectyou in any way?

9. How long have you been out in space?

10.What made you want to go into space? What are some risk factors you take intoconsideration?

11.Can you describe what liftoff is like? Do you get nervous?

12.What kind of things do you experiment with? Plants? Seeds? Other things?

13.What is the most interesting or beautiful thing that you have experienced inspace?

14.How do you go to the bathroom in space?

15.How do you feel physically in space? Will it be hard readjusting when you comeback from space?

16.What kind of food do you miss from home that you don’t have in space?

17.What is your day-to-day routine in space?

18.Is it comfortable sleeping in space?

19.What made you want to become an astronaut?

20.What is the most important skill to have as an astronaut?

21.What kind of activities do you do in space? Or when you're on earth?

AboutAxiom:

Axiom Mission 2 (Ax-2) will be Axiom Space’s second all-privateastronaut mission to the International Space Station (ISS), marking anotherpivotal step toward Axiom Station, the world’s first commercial space stationand successor to the ISS.

About ARISS:

Amateur Radio on the InternationalSpace Station (ARISS) is a cooperative venture of international amateur radiosocieties and the space agencies that support the International Space Station(ISS). In the United States, sponsors are the Radio Amateur SatelliteCorporation (AMSAT), the American Radio Relay League (ARRL), the ISS NationalLab-Space Station Explorers, Amateur Radio Digital Communications (ARDC) andNASA’s Space Communications and Navigation program (SCaN). The primary goal ofARISS is to promote exploration of science, technology, engineering, the arts,and mathematics topics. ARISS does this by organizing scheduled contacts viaamateur radio between crew members aboard the ISS and students. Before andduring these radio contacts, students, educators, parents, and communities takepart in hands-on learning activities tied to space, space technologies, andamateur radio. For more information, see http://www.ariss.org

MediaContact:

DaveJordan, AA4KN

ARISSPR

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