ARISS Contact Scheduled for Students at St Joseph’s Catholic Primary School, Bombala, New South Wales, Australia
June 8, 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 telebridge contact via amateur radio and students will take turns asking their questions of Astronaut Shane Kimbrough, amateur radio call sign KE5HOD. English is the language that will be used during 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 437.525 MHZ and may be heard by listeners that are within the ISS-footprint that also encompasses the telebridge station.
The ARISS team in Casale Monferrato, Italy will use call sign IK1SLD to serve as the ARISS relay amateur radio ground station.
The ARISS radio contact is scheduled for June 10, 2021 at 8:45 pm AEST (Bombala, NSW, Australia), (10:45 UTC, 6:45 am EDT, 5:45 am CDT, 4:45 am MDT and 3:45 am PDT).
St Joseph’s Catholic Primary School is a rural school (Kindergarten to Year 6, with 62 students enrolled) located between the Snowy Mountains and the Far South Coast, in the southern tablelands of NSW Australia. The school has a focus on developing student interest in science, technology, engineering and mathematics. Student activities include an introduction to coding, robotics, virtual reality and 3D printing. Students will also learn about the Universe by participating in a field trip to the Canberra Deep Space Communication Centre.
As time allows, students will ask these questions:
- What is the process for getting up and down from the International Space Station?
- Does zero gravity up there affect the way you are when you come back down to earth?
- How long have you all been on the space station for?
- What do the shooting stars look like when they go past your space station?
- How does a satellite provide internet?
- What made you want to be an astronaut?
- How do you keep warm?
- How long has the space station been around for/ when was it built and who by?
- Does outside in space always look the same?
- Have you seen any space junk?
- Thank you for answering our questions, to finish up we would like to know what advice you would give to someone who wanted to be an astronaut.