This episode of HamTalk Live is brought to you
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we go, welcome to Hamtop Live Calling let's talk,
Neil's your guy Hamtop Live, here we go Hello
everyone, it's time for another episode of HamTalk
Live. It's episode number 295, The Return of
NASA on the Air, recorded on Friday, April 29th,
2022. I'm your host, Neil Rapp, WB9VPG. Thanks
for tuning into this episode of HamTalk Live.
Tonight we're joined by Jayant Ramakrishnan,
KG5LJZ. Last episode, Carol Perry WB2MGP was
here to talk about the 2022 Dayton to Hamvention
Youth Forum and to preview that. So if you missed
that show, you can listen anytime over at HamTalkLive
.com or on your favorite podcast app or on YouTube.
Or you can catch the rebroadcast of HamTalk Life
every week on WTWW Shortwave. five zero eight
five a m and that runs saturday afternoons usually
about three thirty p m eastern time so i'll be
back with jay it right after this word from icon
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radios. and he just can't put it down. Now, here's
more HamTalk Live! Welcome back to HamTalk Live
tonight. Jayant Ramakrishnan, KG5LJZ joins us
on the Orlando Amateur Radio Club and Hamcation
Zoom line. Jayant is in Houston, Texas and is
a member of the Johnson Space Center Amateur
Radio Club. W5 RRR and Desiree Bacchus KM6CTR
are co -chairing the 2022 version of NASA on
the Air. So here's Jayet. Well we're here to
talk about NASA on the Air and we were just talking
about NASA on the Air and the year -long event
and now all of a sudden it's back. So tell us
about bringing NASA on the air back for another
run. So NASA on the air actually occurred a few
years back before the pandemic and was run by
Rob Suggs and Matt McDougall and his team at
the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center. I'm a
relatively new inductee into this activity and
I got inducted by you know W5OC and we said,
hey, it'll be a good thing to get it back on
the air. The club, the club, DiskiFi Rocket,
Rocket, Rocket, the NASA Johnson Space Center
Amateur Radio Club was doing a lot of parks on
the air and doing a lot of activities. And I
was, I basically teamed up with my co -chair,
Desiree Backus, and we said it'd be a cool idea
to get it back on the air for the 50th anniversary
of Apollo 16. And that's basically what we started
doing. And this month of April, 2022, we started
doing the NASA on the Air for the 50th anniversary
of Apollo 16. We contacted many, many clubs.
We contacted a lot of the NASA centers, 10 of
them, and we talked to many of them. Many of
them very enthusiastically joined in and operated
different modes. basically pulled it off the
last two weeks in April. So we have been on there
in one way or the other from April 16th all the
way to April 27th. Very good. All those anniversaries
fell together a couple years ago and now there's
some more. So you hit this one the last couple
of weeks here. But there's some more coming up,
so tell us about those. Yeah, so we are also
having Apollo 17 coming up later this year. And
we also have some events which Desiree has been
very kind enough to kind of let us know that
these are the other events that are coming up.
And we are also planning to, this particular
event for Apollo 16, we got mentored by NASA
Marshall Space Flight Center. And Johnson took
the lead on this, and we ran this NASA on the
air. But for some of the other events, we are
also thinking of circulating it between some
of the other NASA centers and having them take
the leadership role in that. And we are looking
forward to the Apollo 17 anniversary, which is
coming later this year. But in addition to these
anniversaries, we are also interested in doing
current events. There are going to be some launches
later this year. There's an Artemis launch later
this year. and a couple of other events coming
on and we are looking at all those milestones
that are coming on between now and end of the
year and seeing how we can get that event on
the air and have ham enthusiasts all over the
opportunity to talk to different NASA centers.
Now if people want to work the NASA clubs and
get into NASA on the air once again How should
they find those stations and the dates and all
that information? And then which of the NASA
clubs are involved in this? Yeah, so we have
a WordPress site that we use where we put the
information on the NASA on the air. And we also
keep posting on the Twitter feed like the Kennedy
Space Center has a Twitter feed, N1KSC, November
1, Kilo Sierra Charlie. The Johnson has Whiskey
5 Rocket, Rocket, Rocket. And we also have a
website. I believe it's wordpress .nasaontheair
.wordpress .com. And that is where we basically
post the information about these events that
are coming up. And when we have the event, we
also post it on the DX watch and we basically
post the frequencies that we are on and we send
that information out as well. Okay, so you're
running this pretty much like most big special
events. You're on the spots. You've got a website
that has all the lists on it and I believe it's
on QRZ .com as well. Is that right? Yes, so we
have NASA on the air dot period WordPress period
calm That is the website where if you go we tell
you what is going on what and we updated as often
as we can and I'm actually at the website. It's
a pretty cool website and it tells you what's
happening and once the event is over we basically
have a place where you can upload the ADIF file
and different NASA centers are doing that. And
you can look up to see how you worked on the
air with NASA. The clubs that we approached were
the AIMS Research Center, November Alpha 6, Mike
Foxtrot, the Armstrong Flight Research Center.
Both of these are in California. and that is
the NA -6SA, the Glenn Research Center, NA -8SA,
the Goddard Space Flight Center, Diski Alpha
-3, November, Alpha, November, the Jet Propulsion
Lab, which has two call signs, W6JPL and W6VIO,
the Johnson Space Center, W5ROCKETROCKETROCKET,
the Kennedy Space Center, N1KSC, the Marshall
Space Flight Center, NN4SA, the Stennis Space
Flight Center, N5SSC, White Sands Test Facility
and the Mesilla Valley Radio Club, N5BL. So we
have all these clubs listed and we also started
tweeting. And another thing that we did was that
we also posted many of these events on the local
clubs. For instance, the BWAR club is very active
in Houston. So I had sent them information about
this. I went on the air on several local nets.
telling people about the NASA on their special
event, knowing fully well that even if we were
on 20 meters, they would not be able to reach
Johnson in the local area, but they could reach
some of my sister clubs in Alabama or in Florida
or in California. Well, that's very cool. All
right. Well, we're going to take a break and
when we come back, we're going to talk about
certificates and logs and and all that kind of
thing right after this word from tower electronics
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anytime at PL -259 .com. Welcome back to HamTalk
Live. Be sure to check us out on Facebook, Twitter
and Instagram and we'll get back with Jant from
the Johnson Space Center Amateur Radio Club and
NASA on the air right after the joke of the week.
Now it's time for the HamTalk Live Ham Radio
Joke of the Week, the part of the show where
Rick tells us a ham radio joke. The HamTalk Live
Ham Radio Joke of the Week is brought to you
by QRM Labs. Now, here's Rick Garrett in 9GSU
with today's HamTalk Live Joke of the Week. There's
a new 2 meter radio on the market that has a
camera in it so you can snap a selfie while you're
operating I really want one of those as a matter
of fact. I can't picture myself without it This
has been the ham talk live ham radio joke of
the week with Rick Garrett in nine GSU Tune in
again next week for another joke from Rick Maybe
he needs one of those ID 52s with that D star
picture thing going on. Maybe, maybe that's it.
All right, Rick, thank you very much. And we'll
catch you again next week. But right now we're
going to get back to Jant Ramakrishnan KG5 LJZ
with NASA on the air. We're back with J KG5 LJZ.
And he is in Houston, Texas and member of the
Johnson Space Center Amateur Radio Club, which
is a part of NASA on the air, which is what we're
talking about on this episode. So Jay, you talked
about how people can find those dates and everything
and work the station. So once they work. the
NASA clubs during this event, how do they check
to make sure that they're in the log and get
a certificate or QSL card? Tell us how to get
all those confirmations. So what we do at the
end of the event is we basically create the ADI
file and we upload it to our nasaondair .wordpress
.com. This is the site where we upload it by
center. And there's a button which you can press
to confirm that your call sign is there. And
what we do at the end of that year is we basically
generate these very nice certificates which can
be downloaded. In some cases, some clubs also
are planning to send out QSL cards. And so the
website is very, very intuitive. It's also got
a lot of information. And you can get data of
the website. It's got a blog, it's got news,
and it's got lots of data on it. And Neil, thank
you for giving me this opportunity to get on
the air. Like I said, I'm a newbie at this. First
time I'm doing this for the club. And this event,
NASA Johnson Space Flight Center, this key fire
rocket, rocket, rocket, took the lead on this.
And we are planning several other events. Like
I said, Apollo 17 is coming up, the Artemis launch
is coming up, and we are planning to get the
clubs on the air. And you asked me a question
about which clubs participated. For the weekend,
the first full weekend, April 23rd to 24th, 2022,
the kickoff was fun and successful. The clubs
that were active and spotted for the N1 KSC,
November 1, Kilo Sierra Charlie, the Kennedy
Space Center club, on 20 meters, 30 slash SSB.
The NN4SA, November, November 4, Sierra Alpha,
Marshall Space Flight Club, 40 meters, 20 meters,
FT -8, SSB. And the Stennis Space Center Club,
N5SSC, 2015 on FT -8. And the Johnson Space Center
Club, the Whiskey Fire Rocket, Rocket, Rocket,
on 15, 20, 40, on FT -8, CW, and SSB. And the
Ames Research Center, November Alpha 6 Mike Foxtrot
on 20 meters and FD8. So we also were able to
talk between the clubs. So the Johnson Space
Center spoke with Kennedy, they spoke with Mara,
with Aims and with Marshall and we did it on
SSB and we did it sometimes on 15 meters, sometimes
on 10 meters depending on the distance, depending
on the propagation and depending on other conditions.
It was a truly epic event. And it was so much
fun to answer the questions from so many people.
And just, Neil, just for your information, the
crew of Apollo 16 was John Young, Charlie Duke,
Tom Mettingly, and it was launched on, we had
the information of its launch on April 16th,
1972, and its landing on April 27th, and we had
the recovery ship. And we also had several special
people on the air talking about Apollo 16 and
what the mission objectives were. We have a lot
of data and a lot of STEM related information
to the people calling in. Back to you, Neil.
Oh, that's great. I always love that. Now, you
didn't do this alone. We mentioned Desiree, who
is co -chairing. That's KM6CTR. But you also
had a lot of coordination between the clubs and
some teleconferences and everything. So tell
us a little bit about the coordination between
all the clubs that took place to pull this off.
So we had a lot of help from the NASA Marshall
Space Flight Center. They had spearheaded the
earlier NASA On The Air event that you spoke
about, Neil, and they were very good in mentoring
us and asking us to take the lead on this. And
they had a very, very nice website set up. And
like I said, if you go to nasaontheair .wordpress
.com, you'll see all the different things that
they had set up. And they also set up a little
database of sorts to get the data going. Desiree
is basically from the NASA AIMS Research Center,
but she works with both NASA AIMS and NASA Glenn,
and is actually remote right now in Colorado.
and she and I got together and we started having
these Zoom meetings where we invited all the
NASA centers and we told them what we were trying
to do. First of all, Neil came up with a good
email list to make sure that we reached everyone
and then we invited them to a Zoom call, kept
it to 40 minutes with an agenda, and we went
over what we were planning to do, any feedback.
And it was very, very inspiring to talk to the
people at the different clubs to hear what they
had to say and continuously fine -tune this whole
event so that we had coordination between the
clubs and we had some ground rules. For instance,
at Johnson, the ground rule which we used and
which other clubs also used was one person per
one frequency band for one mode. So if, Neil,
you are on 20 meters, than I could be on 20 meters
SSB hauling out W5RRR. And we basically made
sure that we coordinated. We also had some back
channels to talk to each other during the event
where we could make sure that we could share
data. And we learned from each other on what
was working very well, what could be improved.
And every instance of getting on the air became
better and better. Back to you, Neil. I'll add
some great tips for people who are putting on
special events. That always makes a huge difference
to have those lines of communication going in
the background as well as on the air with all
those people calling you. So that's some cool
stuff. So make sure you check out the website.
It's nasa on the air. So N -A -S -A -O -N -T
-H -E -A -I -R dot WordPress, W -O -R -D -P -R
-E -S -S dot com and check that out and you'll
see some of those announcements and again the
Twitter feeds. especially Kennedy, N1KSC. Check
them out and they'll have the announcements as
these NASA events come up for the rest of the
year. Well Jay, before we go, I wanted to talk
to you a little bit about how you got connected
into amateur radio club there at Johnson and
how you got into ham radio. So tell us a little
bit about your story of of how you got into all
this. Neel, I'm happy to do that. It's been a
journey which has been very rewarding, and I'm
very, very thankful for the events that led to
that. And I also want to let you know that there
are other NASA centers also on Twitter. The JSC
Amateur Radio Club is also on Twitter, and I
will send you all the handles. And those also,
we have been tweeting on all the handles. the
event details. I got in because I basically started
volunteering with the MS Society in Texas, riding
a bike 150 miles from Houston to Austin over
two days, raising awareness and funds for multiple
sclerosis. And after I joined and started doing
a couple of rides, I was inducted into the Ride
Marshall, which is basically another program
they run where they They have us basically get
trained and we not only ride from Houston to
Austin, this year it's Houston to College Station,
but we also help cyclists along the way with
mechanical issues. They run into flats, chains
falling off or some other issues and we are also
CPR trained and we are trained in rudimentary
first aid. So the organizers found that we were
going through small towns. We were 13 ,000 cyclists
going through towns which had a population of
300 and 500. And we were overwhelming the cell
phone towers. And someone came up with the idea
of why don't we have them pass the technician
exam and become ham radio operators. This way
they can communicate to the command center from
the road and they are our eyes and ears on the
road. So they basically told the ride marshals,
they encourage us to get this, take this exam
and get trained. And I basically took a Saturday,
went to a class, attended the class. They taught
me a lot of stuff and then later took the exam
and got certified as a ham radio operator. Didn't
know what ham radio was, didn't know how to program
the ham radio. I bought a ham radio and I'm like,
what do I do with this? What is an offset? What
is a tone? How do I plug in the frequency? What
is chirp? I didn't know any of this stuff. And
I looked around and there was the NASA Johnson
Space Flight Center amateur radio club. And I
gave the president a call and said, I have lots
and lots of questions. I have the manual, I have
a radio and I have a license. And they were very
kind. They took me in, taught me the stuff, helped
me program the radio. and slowly got me and I
joined the club because I was learning so much
from them. And that's how Neil, I got into this
profession. All right. Well, that's a great story.
So I wanted to make sure that we share that here
tonight. So Jay, any final words here before
we wrap this up? Yeah, this was a lot of work.
And I was very scared about all the things that
I may be missing. And working with the different
clubs, with Desiree, with David Lee, Whiskey
5 Oscar Charlie, my club mentors, John Maka,
Tanner, Terry Quick, Terry Moore, lots of people
who are very accomplished. And working with different
antennas. We also discussed antennas and QRM.
and interference and everything else, and a club
trustee, John Maka, AB5SS, did a wonderful job
explaining to me the electromagnetics and how
we needed to be separated. And at the end of
the day, it kind of just came together through
Providence. And, you know, it was a wonderful
experience. It was wonderful to give back. And
it was wonderful to get, you know, some of the
students in the shack, you know, and seeing what
we were doing and getting interested in this.
So overall, it went very well. And the nice thing,
Neil, was yesterday was the 60th anniversary
of the NASA Johnson Space Center. And we had
a radio event yesterday, a special event for
four hours yesterday, where we again used what
we had done over NOTA for the one center, and
we got on the air. So it's been very, very gratifying.
I'm extremely grateful to all of you out there,
and Neil, to you for Putting this podcast and
other things together and teaching us. I watch
a lot of YouTube videos I watch a lot of podcasts
and I'll tell you my friend I'm learning every
day and That is a fun part of it. And thank you
so much for your generosity of time and spirit
Well, you're most welcome. We appreciate you
being here and Filling in everybody about NASA
on the air. It's back for another run, so Thanks
so much Jay and Appreciate you being on the show
and hope to catch you on the air on Nota Thank
you so much Neil. I appreciate it. Thank you
so much Well, that is a wrap for this edition
of HamTalk Live. I'd like to thank my guest,
Jant Ramakrishnan, KG5LJZ, and everybody out
there in cyberspace for listening and invite
you back next time for a list of all of our upcoming
guests. Visit HamTalkLive .com. So for now, this
is Neil Rapp, WB9VPG, saying seven, three, seven,
five. and may the good DX be yours. Let's check
it with Rick, it seems clear We're warm and cozy
in our shack So we have talked about thousands
of things About shoes, about ships, about ceiling
wax About cabbages and keys So 73s, to you and
your family I'll be seeing you burning down the
log You're 73s Can you put it down?