I heard on the news the other day that Owen Garriot's son had lifted off on a Space Mission recently.

This spurred me to look out the audio tape that I made on December 5th 1983 when Owen W5LFL aboard the Shuttle Columbia was our first chance to contact a Ham in Space.

I erected an 8 element crossed Yagi on my shed and rigged ropes to steer it in Azimuth and Elevation. I programmed my Nascom Computer to, once I had the correct post launch parameters, produce accurate Orbit Predictions. I took time off work to be in the shack for the first available close pass.

The sound track on this video is the recording I made.