*ARISS News Release No. 24-65*

*Dave Jordan, AA4KN *

*ARISS PR*

*aa4kn@amsat.org aa4kn@amsat.org*

*FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE*

*ARISS Contact is Scheduled with Students at *

*Colegio Cervantes, Torreon, Mexico*

October 16, 2024—Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) has received schedule confirmation for an ARISS radio contact between an astronaut aboard the International Space Station (ISS) and students at the Colegio Cervantes located in Torreon, Mexico. ARISS conducts 60-100 of these special amateur radio contacts each year between students around the globe and crew members with ham radio licenses aboard the ISS.

Colegio Cervantes is an 84-year-old institution located in northern Mexico, in Torreón Coahuila. The school has about 1,600 students (elementary – 12th grade). The school’s STEM learning and robotics project will enable students to better understand and appreciate this ARISS contact.

This will be a telebridge Contact via Amateur Radio allowing students to ask their questions of astronaut Don Pettit, amateur radio call sign KD5MDT. The downlink frequency for this contact is 145.800 MHz and may be heard by listeners that are within the ISS-footprint that also encompasses the telebridge station.

The ARISS amateur radio ground station (telebridge station) for this contact is in Greenbelt, Maryland, U.S. The amateur radio volunteer team at the ground station will use the callsign K6DUE, to establish and maintain the ISS connection.

The ARISS radio contact is scheduled for October 18, 2024 at 10:59 am CST (Torreon, Mexico) (16:59 UTC, 12:59pm EDT, 11:59 am CDT, 10:59am MDT, 9:59 am PDT).

*_______________________________*

As time allows, students will ask these questions:

1. What is the greatest benefit that humanity has obtained from space exploration?

2. What will be NASA’s next mission?

3. What is the distance that the rocket or spacecraft needs to reach after launching to separate and keep flying freely into space?

4. What is the most marvelous thing that you have experienced in space?

5. Is there any activity made by robots in the international space station?

6. What happens when an astronaut gets sick while in space?

7. What is the most wonderful thing about being an astronaut?

8. Since the station orbits the Earth every 90 minutes with 16 sunrises and sunsets per day, how do you manage to sleep?

9. What type of research are you working on at the moment?

10. Can you describe what is it like to do a spacewalk?

11. What do you feel when looking down at Earth?

12. What is the most ambitious project that NASA is currently working on?

13. What has been the most difficult and the happiest experience you have had in a space mission?

14. In terms of exploration, where are we going next?

15. How do you prepare physically and psychologically for space missions?

16. If something happened on Earth, could we go to Mars? What conditions does that planet have that would make it possible for us to live there?

17. Has your perspective on Earth and life changed after being in space?

*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 ISS. In the United States, sponsors are the American Radio Relay League (ARRL), Amateur Radio Digital Communications (ARDC), Radio Amateur Satellite Corporation (AMSAT), NASA’s Space Communications and Navigation program (SCaN) and the ISS National Lab—Space Station Explorers. 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 http://www.ariss.org.

Media Contact:

Dave Jordan, AA4KN

ARISS PR

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