LATEST NEWS
Thunmanskolan ARISS
contact with Christer Fuglesang SA0AFS/KE5CGR (publ. 19 dec 2006)
Little
did I know when I started the project two years ago, that it would become one
of the highlights in 
my life. But let me take
it from the beginning. I started my HAM voyage 26 years ago with the callsign ON7EV. Like many of us, I have always been
fascinated by all things mechanical and electrical to the point that I became
an electronical engineer and from there stepped over
to become an airline pilot. I do remember seeing the first man on the moon as
an eight year old and the sounds and pictures made an ever lasting impression
on me.
Let’s
fast forward to 2002, year when I put up my little antenna tower (100+ feet) in
the backyard. I was perfectly happy for 2 years until city hall decided
otherwise by telling me I needed a building permit. In the legal intermezzo
which followed, I had the opportunity to present to a city hall official what
Ham radio was all 
about. To emphasize this
was a serious hobby; I mentioned that even the ISS had a ham radio station
permanently mounted on board. This aroused the city hall official’s interest
and before I knew it, I had told him I would arrange for a contact between the
ISS and the local school. Boy, I definitely did not know what I was getting
into! I had been having all my fun on short wave and the little dabbling I had
had with satellites were with the old RS 10/11 satellites. But, being a Ham,
one is never too old to learn so up came some more antennas and experiments
were started using old Oscar-7 in both mode A and mode B. I was learning real
fast the art of tracking and tuning two radios and antenna controllers with
only two hands. And I had fun!
At
the same time, I contacted the local school and hit upon a teacher in physics,
Thomas Nordlöv who, upon hearing of the ARISS project, immediately realized the
potential it had. So we filled in the ARISS application and the idea hit me:
Imagine if we could have our QSO with Christer
Fuglesang. First Swedish Astronaut, First ARISS QSO
with Scandinavia, First ARISS QSO with
We
worked hard for two years, and even got the kids to send in some drawings to be
launched together with SuitSat. It was tough at times
since the support from teachers at the school was not always the best. Thomas
spirit never dwindled though and neither did mine. In one way, I can understand
what the other teachers must have thought. Picture this: A guy comes in and
tells them that he can work so that their school will be the only school in the
world whose student will talk to the first Swedish astronaut when he’ll be in
space. They must have thought: ”Yeah….Right…!”
Anyway,
we just kept working towards our goal. New problems kept popping up all the
time and we kept resolving them. Slowly, the far fetched dream was becoming
reality and the one to a million odds got better and better. And then we got
the go ahead from the ARISS team and NASA. The date was December 17th 2006..
I
had taken Two weeks vacation starting from the launch date of STS-116 so I
could spend all my time on the task at hand. Two days prior to our scheduled
contact, I barely slept 4 hours a night. There was still so much to do. There
was only Thomas and I running the show. I got a company to lend me two of their
5 square meter projector screens and a parent of one of the students had a
contact so we could get hold of a pair of professional computer projectors. A
few calls to my Scout leader colleagues and I had a team of helpers. There were
of course a few amateurs included.
10:00
z. Time to start installing everything in the sport complex which could take
about 1000 people. The projectors where mounted on the wall. Up came the 2 grey
giant glass projector screens. As we were adjusting one of the screens, a
shout:” Look out”. Time came to a standstill as one of the screens came
crashing down in a horrible noise of breaking parts. I swear my hart stopped
beating. There was a complete silence for 5 seconds and then I think I said
something which I censor here. The time was 12:30 z, five and a half hours away
from show time. Regaining my composure, I called my wife
One
minute to AOS, the room got very quiet. You could
hear a pin drop. Shane, VK4KHZ made a single call to NA1SS who replied
immediately! The audio was crisp and clear. People were standing in awe. Go
ahead 
Astronaut Christer
Fuglesang came through the speaker, ”Hello Moa”. Moa’s
tight face relaxed into a very happy excited smile when she heard Christer
answering her question.
As
for me, I just heard the voice talking but never really heard what he was
saying. I was so focused on getting the children into position and giving them
the go ahead for their question. It went extremely well. Just before LOS
occurred, Christer said ”OVER” I am pretty sure that I managed to squeeze in a
deafening applause from the audience.
After that, I remained on the stage in front of 500 people, numerous
reporters, TV and radio stations, all eyes fixed upon me. When Gaston finally
dropped the Telebridge line, I remained silent for a
second and then I screamed:” YES”, my fist pumping the air. The public exploded
in cheers and applauses. Photoflashes where going off all over the place and I
turned towards Thomas, hugged him and kept saying ”We did it, amazing, we did
it!”
It
is now December 19th and I am slowly drifting back to earth. This
has been an amazing experience. The kids will never forget this; I can see it
in their eyes! A special bond unites them Thomas and I. It was definitely worth
two years of my life!
73,
a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year
Eskil/SM5SRR
Thunmanskolan
ARISS Project 2006,
18 DECEMBER
WE DID IT! AMAZING,
WHAT A KICK!, WHAT A RUSH. INCREDIBLE. THANK YOU TO ALL WHO HAVE MADE THIS
POSSIBLE. A MORE DETAILED REPORT WILL FOLLOW AS SOON AS I HAVE CAUGHT MY
BREATH….
16 DECEMBER
EchoLink *AMSAT*
(101 377) and *JK1ZRW* (277 208) servers. The audio from this event will
also be fed into the IRLP Discovery Reflector
9010.
NASA SAYS ”GO” FOR OUR CONTACT WITH OUR FIRST SWEDISH ASTRONAUT, CHRISTER FUGLESANG,
SA0AFS (ASTRONAUT FROM
LOCATION: HÄLSOHUSET IN KNIVSTA
17:30: DOORS TO HÄLSOHUSET OPEN
18:00: 30 MINUTES
PRESENTATION.
18:49: TELEPHONE
RINGS. TELEBRIDGE IS ACTIVATED.
AND ALSO MODERATOR FOR THE EVENT,
GASTON BERTELS, ON4WF, PRESENTS THE
PARTICIPANTS AND EXPLAINS WHAT WILL
HAPPEN.
19:05: DOORS OF HÄLSOHUSET CLOSE
19:18: SHANE LYND, VK4KHZ IN GLENDEN
(POPULATION. 1200 ),
CALLS THE INTERNATIONAL SPACE
STATION ISS, CALLSIGN: NA1SS
19:19 MOA CORSE,
FIFTH GRADE, ASKS THE FIRST QUESTION TO CHRISTER FUGLESANG,
EVERYBODY IS
WELCOME. PLEASE MAKE SURE THAT YOUR GSM/CELLPHONE IS
TURNED OFF DURING THIS HISTORICAL EVENT.
14 DECEMBER FLASH
NEWS
From: Gaston BERTELS
Sent: Thursday, December 14, 2006 7:18 PM
To: Eskil
Subject: ARISS
Importance: High
Eskil,
An additional EVA to fix the solar array issue is
being looked at for Sunday, Dec 17 or Monday Dec 18. If the EVA is scheduled,
an additional docked day will be added.
If they decide on a Sunday EVA, we will likely lose
the contact with
We may not know until the weekend so let folks know
the contact date could move last minute. Things are very dynamic at the moment.
Please inform all parties involved.
73
Gaston - ON4WF
12 DECEMBER
THE DATE FOR OUR CONTACT WITH
CHRISTER FUGLESANG IS NOW CONFIRMED FOR SUNDAY AT 19:19H LOCAL TIME (18:19 UTC)
10 DECEMBER
Waiting
for a message from NASA via Gaston, ON4WF, with date and time for our contact
with Astronaut Christer Fuglesang.
08 DECEMBER
It
turned into a long night at the launch vigil in Rymdbas
Stockholm where French Astronaut Jean-Francois Clervoy
explained to the audience what was happening during the different stages of the
launch sequence. He had himself been up in space three times and was therefore
able to comment with very interesting details.
In
regards to the ARISS contact between Thunmanskolan and Christer Fuglesang; not
much has changed. Our ARISS colleagues are now analyzing which passages of the
ISS will be most appropriate for our contact. As soon as they have the results,
they will check with us after which different dates will be submitted to NASA
for approval. Three days prior to the actual contact, we will know which day
and time we are talking about.
Thomas
Nordlöv and I had a dry run of the questions in both English and Swedish with
the students today. The students are really motivated and enthusiastic which is
a real kick in itself!
Thunmanskolan
has received quite a lot of attention in the Swedish press, radio and
television. It is great to see how the kids enjoy the limelight. They are
becoming real pros by now.
Now,
we are keeping our fingers crossed for the next launch try to be successful!
29 NOVEMBER
The hunt
for Swedish speaking people who can be present at the ground control station
which will be used continues. My wife Helena came up with the great idea of contacting SWEA ( Swedish
Women's Educational Association). After a few Emails
and phone calls to
Last Friday, I went to
I now received a copy of an Email
stating the following: The call has been agreed to in principle but it now
requires that time is found for it during the mission.
The latest status:
-
The request is currently with the NASA planners for timelining.
The call will require 10 min for the actual call and 5 min for setup
The request is for the call to be done in the morning in
-
Christer
has requested that it be done after EVA 2
So far, so good…