September 27: New England Sci-Tech (NESci-Tech) students enjoyed an ARISS radio contact held in an arena with huge monitors at the 2022 Big E (exposition) in West Springfield, MA. Bob Hines supported the contact; he answered 17 questions. 250 viewers came to watch and another 187 viewed the livestream. An 11-year-old exclaimed that she was fascinated by “…all the new opportunities there are about new discoveries, new planets, and even new life.” Two older students had always wanted to become an astronaut and said the contact just reinforced that. The STEM educator declared it an exciting contact, “…and from the students’ perspective, it was amazing! All parents are extremely grateful for this opportunity for their children.” A few days after the contact, over 2,000 people saw the YouTube recording. See (begin at 9 minutes): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hdxnD8uF8t0. Shortly before the contact, WGGB-TV interviewed ARISS Technical Mentor Fred Kemmerer. Media stories were done by CBS-03, ABC-TV40, Fox TV 06 and 22, The Sun Chronicle in Attleboro, and BusinessWest.com in Springfield. The Big E is the 6th largest fair in the US and represents 6 New England states. The Hampden County Radio Association from Springfield set up and staffed a booth on ham radio and ARISS for the entire 17-day fair. NESci-Tech, a STEM education center, provides hands-on learning and research opportunities to youth and families on space science, model rocketry, astronomy (utilizing a planetarium and telescopes), robots, ham radio, and more. Sci-Tech Amateur Radio Society members led hands-on lessons about ham radio and communications skills for this contact.
October 3: St. Stephen’s Episcopal School in Houston, Texas hosted an ARISS contact with Bob Hines who answered 17 student questions while 87 students and parents in the room and other rooms were listening. The livestream for the community garnered 145 viewers. The school’s program prior to the contact featured a girl who reviewed four NASA initiatives students had researched: DART, Dream Chaser, Artemis, and Mars Rovers. After the contact ARISS educator Charlie Larrabee led a Q&A for inquisitive youth to ask more questions about space and radio. The Katy News posted a story before the contact, see
https://thekatynews.com/2022/09/30/st-stephens-students-to-talk-to-astronauts-on-international-space-station/, which had listed the URL for the community to watch the contact. The school’s Da Vinci Lab engages students in hands-on lessons on basic electronic circuits, basic coding, researching the design and creation of 3D printed items, and how to capture ARISS Slow Scan TV images (picture downlinks). The youth built antennas to engage with the ARISS cross band repeater and ARISS APRS (automatic packet reporting system). Members of the Brazos Valley Amateur Radio Club helped support the ARISS contact.
September 30: The ARISS-Russia Team scheduled an ARISS radio contact for 250 undergrad students, graduate students, and staff of the Pavel Sukhoi State Technical University in Gomel, Belarus. Sergey Prokopyev supported the contact, which was aided by Russian amateur radio operators on the ground.
October 1: Dmitry Petlin spoke during an ARISS contact to a group of Aznakaevo youth in the Republic of Tatarstan, Russia. The boys and girls took part in the Gagarin in Space lessons through the ARISS-Russia team who supported the ARISS contact.
September 29: Youth at Harris Middle School in Spruce Pine, NC have been preparing for their upcoming ARISS radio contact. ARISS Education Ambassador Martha Muir reported that STEM teacher Dan Hopson began leading students last spring in lessons on space, the ISS, astronauts, and communications. Lessons continued through summer and into fall semester. In August, Dan won his school district’s Teacher of the Year award because of his STEM lessons for the 267 students at his school. He guided his students in building radio antennas and establishing a school amateur radio club, and he won a grant from the College Foundation for Western North Carolina to purchase amateur radio satellite equipment. 29 youth took part in ARRL Field Day, an exercise to set up and operate a radio station without the use of commercial power. 12 youth participated in an ARRL VHF radio contest to practice on-the-air communications skills with ham radio operators in their state and surrounding states.
October 6: Ten youth in the Nizhny Novgorod Cadet School, an educational institution in Nizhny Novgorod, Russia took part in an ARISS contact with Sergey Prokopyev. Youth had been learning about the Gagarin in Space lessons. The ARISS-Russia team planned the radio contact.
ARISS Upcoming Events
Oct 11 Harris Middle School, Spruce Pine NC ARISS contact, ARISS-US Team
Oct 13 Regional Communications Center of Russian Railways, Vologda, Russia ARISS-Russia Team