Now part of the ISS Expedition 15 crew, US astronaut Suni Williams, KD5PLB,has continued her run of successful Amateur Radio on the International SpaceStation (ARISS) school contacts. In late April, she enlightened youngstersin Italy, Germany, Virginia and Illinois about what it's like to live aboardthe ISS. Williams has been in space since December and is scheduled toreturn home next month via the space shuttle that will bring herreplacement. During the first of two ham radio conversations on April 23with students at the Scuola Europea Varese in Varese, Italy, Williamsallowed that she's growing tired of space meals.

"They were tasty for the first couple of months, but now it's getting alittle bit old, because the menu sort of repeats," Williams responded. "It'sabout a 10-day cycle, and then you start eating the same things over andover again, so I try to be creative and mix new things with each other."

Shane Lynd, VK4KHZ, served as the Earth station for the event. Students atthe school spent about three months learning about the ISS. An audience ofabout 300 looked on during the contact, which attracted media coverage fromnewspapers and television. Verizon Conferencing provided a teleconferencinglink between Australia and Italy.

A few hours later, youngsters at Kingston Elementary School in VirginiaBeach, Virginia, spoke with Williams during a direct VHF contact betweenNA1SS and control op Ed Williams, KN4KL. Thirteen Kingston third throughfifth graders participated, while the rest of the school's nearly 600students watched via closed-circuit TV. Julia, whose father had graduatedfrom the US Naval Academy with Suni Williams, wanted to know how long ittook to prepare for a space walk.

"Well, it takes a little while," Williams explained. "It's sort of like whenyou're going diving. We're going to breathe 100 percent oxygen, and so wehave to make sure that we get all the nitrogen out of our system. So that'sthe longest preparation time, and then we have to get the spacesuits ready."She said it typically takes four to five hours before the astronauts areready to open the hatch and go out into space.

Members of the Virginia Beach Amateur Radio Club (VBARC) provided the groundstation and support for the ARISS event, which was the subject of anewspaper article in the Virginian Pilot. (The ARRL Virginia Section Website http://aresva.org/arrlva/news/20070428.ariss_va_beach.html has a copyof the article and additional information.)

Two days later, about a dozen youngsters attending Christian Life ElementarySchool in Rockford, Illinois, had their "day in space." Youngsters therechatted with Williams at the helm of NA1SS via Earth station controloperator Shari Harlan, N9SH. Williams told one questioner that she believesthe next step for the human spaceflight program is to return to the moon.

"We've got a lot that we can learn from living in a different type ofgravity environment if we want to explore further, potentially go out toMars or some other part of the universe," she said. "If we're only at themoon, we'll have only a small delay in communication -- maybe a two-seconddelay -- and we need to learn how to work autonomously without always[having] the help of the ground. It would be nice to have a moon base to seehow that would work and see if we can still survive there."

Upward of 1000 students looked on during the ARISS QSO, and audio and videowere fed live to a local Amateur TV repeater.

On April 28, Williams fielded more questions from students at the Samuel vonPufendorf Gymnasium, a middle and high school of some 675 students inFloeha, Germany. The direct contact was between NA1SS and the school'sAmateur Radio club station DL0GYM, with Harald Schoenwitz, DL2HSC, as thecontrol operator. All of the students who took part in the event hadobtained their Amateur Radio licenses in advance of the contact.

Williams told the students she wished the ISS had Internet access. "Itreally would be helpful," she remarked. She noted the crew does have accessto e-mail, however. She also said that the crew can see the northern lightsfrom above, and on one occasion, an aurora occurred during a space walk. "Itwas a little creepy to see the green lights flashing," she said.

About 50 people plus news media looked on as the approximately 10-minutecontact progressed flawlessly. Five newspapers, three radio stations and theregional TV channel reported on the event. The von Pufendorf contact was the290th since the ARISS program began coordinating ham radio events forschools when the first space station crew came aboard in November 2000.

ARISS is an international educational outreach with US participation byARRL, AMSAT and NASA.

Source:

The ARRL LetterVol. 26, No. 19May 11, 2007