Ottawa, Ontario
ARISS Event: February 5, 2021 – As part of the Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) program, NASA Astronaut Mike Hopkins, KF5LJG, will connect with students from the Ottawa Carleton Virtual Online School in Ottawa, Ontario and answer their questions (see below), live from the International Space Station (ISS).
The ISS call sign is scheduled to be NA1SS event and the will take place on Friday, February 5, 2021 at 17:41:04 UTC 40 deg via AB1OC. It is recommended that you start listening approximately 10 minutes before this time.
The duration of the contact is approximately 9 minutes and 30 seconds. The contact will be a telebridge between NA1SS and AB10C which is located in New Hampshire:
Ground Station Coordinates:
AB1OC New Hampshire Latitude 42.712N; Longitude 71.590W; Elevation 110m
ARISS team member Fred Kemmerer, using his call sign AB1OC in New Hampshire, will serve as the relay Amateur Radio station.
The contact should be audible over the USA and Canada (Eastern regions) and adjacent areas. Interested parties are invited to listen in on the 145.80 MHz downlink. The contact is expected to be conducted in English.
Steve McFarlane, VE3TBD, ARISS Central and Northern Canada representative, is the Mentor for the event and Brian Jackson, VE6JBJ, ARISS Western Canada Mentor, is the Moderator.
ARISS is an international program aimed at inspiring students worldwide to pursue interests and careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) through Amateur Radio communications opportunities with the ISS crew.
For more information on ARISS please visit:
RAC ARISS webpage: https://www.rac.ca/ariss/
Main ARISS website: http://www.ariss.org
Multipoint Telebridge Contact via Amateur Radio
As mentioned above, members will ask their questions to Astronaut Mike Hopkins, KF5LJG, via an adapted telebridge link which will use a multi-point system in which they are connected to the conference call centre from their own homes.
The concept requires three things:
- the ARISS telebridge radio ground station – a satellite Amateur Radio station with special equipment that an ARISS team member uses for teleconferencing
- the astronaut on the International Space Station using the ARISS Amateur Radio station
- students at their homes here on Earth
The telebridge radio operator links to the astronaut at the ARISS radio mic, and each youth then connects from home via their telephones. Their families can listen along with school faculty and the public from home.
ARISS invites the public to view the livestream of the upcoming ARISS contact at: https://youtu.be/Ery1JYmk72o
ISS Expedition 64 Station Crew:
Kate Rubins
Victor Glover
Soichi Noguchi
Sergey Ryzhikov
Michael Hopkins
Shannon Walker
Sergey Kud-Sverchkov
Lists of Questions by Students (ages 6 to 13):
The Ottawa Carleton Virtual Online School provides approximately 300 minutes of daily, instructor-led, online classes for students in Ottawa. Each class provides 20 to 25 students learning opportunities through synchronous and asynchronous learning by using either Virtual Learning Environment or Google Classroom learning management systems. Seventeen classes will participate in this ARISS contact.
As time allows, students will ask the following questions:
- Sham (13 yrs): How does it fell to see the sun, Earth, moon and stars from space?
- Alex (11 yrs): Do you think extraterrestrial beings exist?
- Samantha (6 yrs): Has anything scared you in space and if so how did you deal with it?
- Caitlan (10 yrs): How long does it take to come back to Earth from the International Space Station?
- Zoey (8 yrs): What is the coolest thing you have seen while in space?
- Caden (6 yrs): How can you tell if it’s day or night?
- Farah (10 yrs): What is a dangerous threat that could happen on the ISS, and what could you do to solve it?
- Serene (10 yrs): What is the most frightening thing you have ever seen in space?
- Filip (6 yrs): What experiments are you doing now on the ISS?
- Isabella (9 yrs): What is the biggest challenge in space?
- Yara (7 yrs): How long did you have to train to become an astronaut?
- Ruby (7 yrs): What are the steps involved in leaving the rocket and entering Space Station?
- Yasmin (10 yrs): Are there any cold or hot planets that have been discovered and not revealed to the world?
- Aaliyah (8 yrs): How long can you breathe in a space suit outside the space station?
- Sarah (7 yrs): What happens if there is a fire on the International Space Station?
- Rowan (7 yrs): Is COVID 19 a concern for astronauts?
- Sara (7 yrs): What is it like to come back to Earth after being in Space for months at a time?