Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) Status Report March 19, 2012

1. Upcoming School Contacts

Centre de Formation de la Base Aérienne de Payerne, Switzerland has been scheduled for an Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) contact on Wednesday, March 21 at 08:39 UTC. The contact will be held in the museum "Clin d'Ailes", located on the Payerne Swiss Airforce Base that has on display military aeronautics exhibits from the second half of the 20th century. Mr. Claude Nicollier, HB9CN, who is the first Swiss astronaut and president of the Museum Foundation, plans to attend the event. The Clin d'Ailes Swiss Air Force Museum Ham Radio Club, holding callsigns HB4FR and HB9SPACE, will set up its radio for the contact. Students plan to launch a stratospheric balloon equipped with video and photo cameras and sensors and beacons two weeks prior to the event. After the ARISS contact, they will present the videos, photos and the analysis of the recorded sensor data.

Salem Elementary School in Apex, North Carolina has been scheduled for an ARISS contact on Wednesday, March 21 at 14:09 UTC via station VK5ZAI in Australia. This contact is part of a comprehensive education plan which will pique students' interest in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM).

2. Liberty Junior High Radios Don Pettit on ISS

Students attending Liberty Junior High School in Burbank, Illinois experienced a very successful Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) contact on Wednesday, March 14. Over 800 students, teachers and guests were present as students put their questions to astronaut Don Pettit, KD5MDT on ISS. The ARISS contact highlighted the school's comprehensive education plan covering Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) subject matter. Other activities students participated in included investigating thermal properties of different materials, building models of the ISS and exploring the cast distances of space and the effect of distance and radio waves.

3. Belgium Contact Successful

An Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) contact was held on Friday, March 16 between Middenschool de Regenboog Bree in Bree, Belgium and on-orbit astronaut André Kuipers, PI9ISS. A newly licensed 14 year girl operated the radio during the event while students had all 15 of their prepared questions answered. The contact was carried out as part of a curriculum covering the micro-gravity environment, history of manned spaceflight, commercial spaceflight and the construction of the ISS.

4. Leone Acciaiuoli Students Question ISS Astronaut

On Sunday, March 18, Dan Burbank, KC5ZSX fielded ten questions from youth attending the Istituto Tecnologico Statale Trasporti e Logistica "Leone Acciaiuoli" in Ortona, Italy via an ARISS contact. Approximately 200 people were in attendance, including representatives from two television stations. AMSAT-Italia also provided coverage, streaming video on the Internet. The contact complemented science courses taught at the school such as Navigation, Astronomy, Mathematics, Physics and Satellite Communications and was a featured activity during the International Day of Planetaria.

5. ARISS-U.S. Schools Selected

The NASA Teaching From Space office received 27 U.S. proposals for ARISS contacts that will be scheduled during the second half of this year. The U.S. Selection Committee reviewed the proposals and selected 18 schools for these contacts. The schools will be notified of their status early this week.