Tears and Fears Among Topics of ARISS School Group Contact:

Students at Tregaron Secondary School in Tregaron, Wales, questioned Expedition 11 ISS NASA Science Officer John Phillips, KE5DRY, September 29 about life aboard the International Space Station. Serving as the Earth station for the event was the Radio Society of Great Britain's (RSGB) mobile ham station GB4FUN, controlled by Carlos Eavis, G0AKI, and operated by AMSAT UK's Howard Long, G6LVB. The contact between GB4FUN and NA1SS was arranged by the Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) program. One student asked Phillips what happens to tears if you cry in space.

"Well, that may be the most interesting question of the day," Phillips responded. "I think that the tears would just stay right there on your eyes or possibly on the edge of your cheeks. They wouldn't go very far. I think maybe they'd just stay in your eyes until they evaporate."

Other students at Tregaron asked Phillips if he had any fears or concerns about living in space. Phillips told the students he didn't spend much time worrying about possible problems. "I make sure I'm prepared, but beyond that, I don't worry," he said.

As for being scared, Phillips recounted "a sort of a joke" among the US astronaut corps: "The main thing you're scared of in space is you might do something wrong and look bad, and there's a certain amount of truth to that." Phillips says he worries "a little" that he might make a mistake, but he's not frightened of anything because he has confidence in the ISS, his training and the ISS ground crew

In response to a later question asking if he'd ever had any "embarrassing moments" in space, Phillips said only when he makes a mistake or loses something. "The work we do is watched all the time by the folks on the ground," he pointed out. Answering another question about the spacesuits the crew wears for space walks, Phillips said they are "very functional," but he wouldn't call them comfortable.

In all, Phillips answered 18 questions before the ISS went over the horizon and contact with the school was lost. ARISS-Europe's Gaston Bertels, ON4WF, says Phillips nonetheless continued on to answer the remaining two questions on the list, and "ground stations further east could hear his answers and his signing off."

Upward of 350 students, faculty members and VIPs filled the room at Tregaron, and BBC-TV covered the event. The contact marked the first ARISS school group QSO for a school in Wales and the last for Phillips during his current ISS duty tour.

ARISS http://www.rac.ca/ariss is an international educational outreach with US participation by ARRL, AMSAT and NASA.

Source:

The ARRL Letter Vol. 24, No. 39 October 7, 2005

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