Far out! Jamboree on the Air event crosses the final frontier

How do you expand the reach of an event that’s already global?

Find something out of this world.

This weekend, the National Scouting Museum became the only Jamboree on the Air location on earth to enable 10 Scouts to directly communicate with the International Space Station as it hovered 255 miles above Earth.

The turnout was great, and — as you can see above — the event caught the eye of local news stations in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.

The Scouts chatted with NASA astronaut Sunita Williams, who holds the record for the longest space flight by a woman. It was all part of JOTA, the annual event that links Scouts around the world.

The long-distance call was made possible through a program from NASA and the Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) program. It is one in a series of educational activities in the United States and abroad to improve teaching and learning in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM).

If you weren’t there in person, you can watch a stream of the event here.

Final thought: Anyone want to guess how long until Scouts are talking to someone on Mars?


About Bryan Wendell 3282 Articles
Bryan Wendell, an Eagle Scout, is the founder of Bryan on Scouting and a contributing writer.