Linkup day is here for Emporia and Lyon County elementary students and the International Space Station.
Students will gather at Emporia State’s Prophet Aquatic Research and Outreach Center around 8 am to relay questions to astronauts aboard the space station as part of ARISS — Amateur Radio on the International Space Station. On KVOE’s Talk of Emporia on Tuesday, Peterson Planetarium Director Mark Brown says he’s proud of the effort to get access to the linkup.
There have been several training sessions at PAROC leading up to the ARISS linkup as well as other preliminary activities. Director Alex Hayes says the kids have been fully engaged in the process and the activities — almost.
Both Hayes and Brown say they were grateful to ESU professor Erika Martin, who they say was the driving force behind the ARISS application, and to the Emporia Amateur Radio Society, which did a lot of its own education on radio concepts as well as the setup for Wednesday alongside the ESU IT team.
The livestream begins at 8:30 am and will be available to the public online at emporia.edu/ariss. After introductory remarks at 9, radio operators will start hailing the ISS between 9:05-9:10 am. Linkup is tentatively set for 9:10 am, with the Q&A session ending around 9:20 am.
Meanwhile, there are three larger venues for the community at large to watch the linkup:
*William Allen White Library, located on the ESU campus, featuring a display of space and communication books for all ages.
*Radius Brewing Company production facility, 17 W. Fourth Ave., featuring a virtual reality space station and spacewalk experience.
*Lyon County History Center, 711 Commercial St., featuring child-friendly information and activities in the children’s area on the contact day and throughout April.
All three locations will be open to the public at 8:30 am. PAROC activities are invitation-only.
