During an all-too-brief 10-minute window, as the International Space Station (ISS) flew at 27,000 km/hr above Australia, Doncaster Primary School students were able to speak directly with astronaut Timothy J Creamer on-board the ISS.

Creamer has been on board the ISS since launching aboard a Soyuz rocket from Kazakhstan in December 2009 and is due to return in June this year.

The entire session and infrastructure was provided by ARISS (Amateur Radio on the International Space Station).  ARISS is a world-wide volunteer program to inspire students to "pursue careers in science, technology, engineering and math through amateur radio communications opportunities with the International Space Station (ISS) on-orbit crew."  ARISS is sponsored by the American Radio Relay League, the Radio Amateur Satellite Corporation and NASA.

For younger students, as tonight's group were, this is a chance to ask questions of the ISS team members; for older students there are much wider opportunities for interaction.

In Australia, South Australian resident Tony Hutchison acts as the ARISS coordinator.  Tony is also well-known for running a volunteer communications backup service for NASA to communicate with the ISS.  He has acted in this capacity on a number of occasions.

With Tony's supervision, 5 months of detailed planning was undertaken by the school's Science Co-ordinator, David Kay.  In addition, with the involvement of amateur radio operators in Queensland and Illinois (USA), a direct radio channel was established to Creamer on the ISS and made available to amateur radio operators around the world.

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Here's (technically) how it works.

The school enabled a communications link with Shane Lynd who lives in outback Queensland at the tiny mining community of Glenden.  For this evening's session, Shane operated the equipment that communicated directly with the ISS by maintaining a directional antenna that tracked the ISS as it flew overhead, traversing from horizon to horizon in around 10 minutes.

In addition, John, another amateur radio enthusiast in Montgomery, Illinois captured the entire conversation and re-broadcast it to an international amateur radio audience (at 2:30am local time) via computer-managed broadcast systems.

The children were very excited to have the opportunity to as questions. 

Representing most grades from Prep to Year Six, Audrey, Ethan, Jylon, Raena, Jessica, William, Matthew, Lauren, Ben, Dominic, Artom, Matilda, Jade, Archie, Donny, Isabelle and Addison all took the opportunity to ask questions of their own making.

For such young people, everyone in the audience, and I'm sure Creamer himself was impressed with the quality and insightfulness of the questions.

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Creamer was quizzed about life on the ISS, including how they exercise, how they consume fluids and other foods, how they sleep and relax and how they deal with emergencies.

Additionally, one student asked the perennial question, "Are there aliens in space?"  Creamer offered the diplomatic response "I have not seen any, but if we were able to visit with other beings that came and visited us, I'd be so happy and excited to talk with them.  But we haven't seen any."

Other questions revolved around the control and management of the ISS in orbit, for instance maintaining air supply and dealing with trash.  For instance, "How often do you have to do space walks to make repairs to the space station?" 

Creamer responded with the clear hope that although he was trained to do so, such an activity would not have to be undertaken.

This was an exciting evening for the students, who expressed their thanks and appreciation for the assistance provided by all concerned. 

Schools interested in a similar venture should contact ARISS via their Educational Information page.