Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) has received schedule confirmation for an ARISS radio contact between an astronaut aboard the International Space Station (ISS) and students at the Robert Drake Primary School located in Benfleet, Essex, UK.

Update Oct 22: BBC News report on the event is at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cp8l8lv1v1zo

ARISS conducts 60-100 of these special amateur radio contacts each year between students around the globe and crew members with ham radio licenses aboard the ISS.

The Robert Drake Primary School (with about 313 students) is located in Benfleet, Essex about 30 miles east of London along the Thames estuary.

This will be a telebridge Contact via Amateur Radio allowing students to ask their questions of astronaut Sunita Williams, amateur radio call sign KD5PLB. The downlink frequency for this contact is 145.800 MHz and may only be heard by listeners that are within the ISS-footprint that also encompasses the telebridge station which is in the east coast USA.

The ARISS amateur radio ground station (telebridge station) for this contact is in Greenbelt, Maryland, U.S. The amateur radio volunteer team at the ground station will use the callsign K6DUE, to establish and maintain the ISS connection.

The ARISS radio contact is scheduled for October 21, 2024 at 2:57 PM BST (13:57 GMT) – it was rescheduled to this new time due to Crew 8 undocking sleep shift.

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As time allows, students will ask these questions:

1. What do I need to learn to be an astronaut?

2. What do you do to have fun in space?

3. How long has the international space station been in space?

4. Is time different in space?

5. Do you watch TV? If yes, what do you watch?

6. What do you eat and how do you eat it?

7. What advice would you give kids like me who may want to be an astronaut in the future?

8. How do people drink on the space station?

9. How do you get food and water in space?

10. What is your favourite part of Earth to fly over and why?

11. Have you ever walked in space?

12. What is your favourite part of being an astronaut on the space station?

13. Does it take long to get use to gravity back home?

14. Do you get chance to speak to family in friends and how do you do it?

15. Have you seen any shooting stars or comets whilst on the space station?

About ARISS:

Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) is a cooperative venture of international amateur radio societies and the space agencies that support the ISS. In the United States, sponsors are the American Radio Relay League (ARRL), Amateur Radio Digital Communications (ARDC), Radio Amateur Satellite Corporation (AMSAT), NASA’s Space Communications and Navigation program (SCaN) and the ISS National Lab—Space Station Explorers.

The primary goal of ARISS is to promote exploration of science, technology, engineering, the arts, and mathematics topics. ARISS does this by organizing scheduled contacts via amateur radio between crew members aboard the ISS and students. Before and during these radio contacts, students, educators, parents, and communities take part in hands-on learning activities tied to space, space technologies, and amateur radio. For more information, see http://www.ariss.org/