1. Upcoming School Contacts
The National Air and Space Museum (NASM) in Washington, D.C. has been approved for an Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) contact on Saturday, May 3 at 15:52 UTC via the telebridge station NN1SS in Greenbelt. This year Space Day will celebrate the 50th anniversary of NASA and NASA's achievements through space exploration. Youth, ages 12 -18, will participate. The Washington Post, the NASM Web site and NASM e-news will report on the contact. The event is open to the public and thousands are expected to attend. The audio from this contact is expected to be fed into the EchoLink AMSAT (101 377) and JK1ZRW (277 208) Conference Room servers and the IRLP Discovery Reflector 9010.

An Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) contact has been scheduled for Armada Area Schools in Armada, Michigan on Friday, May 9 at 13:38 UTC. Students will research space exploration, the effects of space on the human body, and technology used for space travel. Middle school students will write essays and high school students will create Power Point presentations. The Detroit News, Detroit Free Press, Armada Times and Macomb Daily newspapers will provide newspaper coverage. The local cable channel will tape and place the contact on the local channels and Channels 2, 4, 7 will also be contacted to provide local Metropolitan Detroit News coverage.

2. Arnold Palmer Hospital Contact Successful
On Monday, April 21, patients at the Arnold Palmer Hospital for Children in Orlando, Florida participated in an Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) contact with Garrett Reisman, KE5HAE, via the telebridge station W6SRJ in California. Reisman answered the 20 questions which had been planned for him and continued answering another three posed by the seven children. Approximately 30 people were in attendance. Orlando television stations Central Florida News 13 and WESH Channel 2 both reported on the event. The audio was fed into the EchoLink AMSAT (101 377) and JK1ZRW (277 208) Conference Room servers and received 24 connections, including 9 link nodes and 3 repeater nodes, from stations in Australia, USA, Belgium, Canada, England, France, Germany, Japan and Spain.

3. ARISS - Russian School Contact
The Peter Klimuk School Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) contact planned for Wednesday, April 23 was unsuccessful due to technical difficulties. The ARISS team is looking into the problem.

4. ESA Astronaut Visits ARISS Schools
ESA astronaut Paolo Nespoli, IZØJPA, gave two presentations to Italian schools which had participated in Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) contacts in October 2007. On Wednesday, April 23, Nespoli spoke to 565 students from Galileo Galilei High School of Civitavecchia, Guglielmo Marconi High School of Civitavecchia and Giosuè Carducci Secondary School in Santa Marinella. On April 24, he spoke with 400 students from Aula Magna of the Faculty of Engineering of the University of L'Aquila. ARISS member Francesco De Paolis, IKØWGF, gave a talk on the ARISS program and Nespoli gave a presentation on the Esperia mission which also highlighted the ARISS contacts. Television stations and newspapers covered the events and photographs have been posted to the ARISS-Europe Web site. See: http://www.ariss-eu.org/2008_04_27.htm

5. Astronaut Training Status
An Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) training session is planned for astronaut Bob Thirsk, VA3CSA, with Cedarview Middle School in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. The training session, which is a terrestrial-based amateur radio contact using ARISS-equivalent equipment, is planned for Thursday, May 1 at approximately 19:30 UTC.

Expedition 19 back-up crew member Chris Hadfield, KC5RNJ/VA3OOG, will attend an ARISS operations training session on Friday, May 2.

Source [url=http://www.rac.ca/ariss/oindex.htm#ARISS Status]ARISS Weekly Status[/url]