When the International Space Station hit the horizon Tuesday (Oct. 13), speeding above the H.R. MacMillan Space Centre at 27,000 km/h, astronaut Dr. Robert Thirsk was able to make contact for just about 10 minutes.

But it was enough time to afford 30 students from Tsawwassen the opportunity to ask him a few burning questions about life in space.

“What effects do you see from global warming? Over,” asked one boy.

“The most impressive thing is the amount of snow cover on mountains decreasing, not day by day, but tens of years by tens of years,” responded Thirsk. “Perhaps the most important mountain that we look at is Mt. Kilimanjaro in Africa. We can see that there is less snow cover on Kilimanjaro then there was 10 or 20 years ago, over.”

“What do you miss the most other than your loved ones? Over,” asked another.

“I think the most that I miss would be a nice hot shower or a bath. I miss fresh food. And you know, I’d really love to have a hamburger right now, over,” said Thirsk to laughs from the students.

The Canadian astronaut was also posed a question he said he'd never been asked before.

"Does gas cause any problems on board? Over."

"We have the same problems with gas in space as you do on earth. We try to be as courteous as possible though, over," he replied in good humour.

The former Boundary Beach Elementary youngsters reached Thirsk near the end of his six-month stay aboard the ISS where he arrived in May.

They lined up outside the space centre, prepared questions in hand, awaiting the signal from Greg Banta with the Langley Amateur Radio Association (LARA).

Boundary Beach Elementary was closed by the district this year, but parents made sure their children, now mostly at South Park and Beach Grove Elementary schools, wouldn’t miss the field trip they’d been planning for months.

Parent Sharon Guilford knows Thirsk from when her family lived in the Clear Lake area of Texas near NASA’s Johnson Space Centre.

“When I moved here I thought it would be just incredible for our children to follow their local hero (Thirsk is from New Westminster) through his mission into space,” she said.

LARA began acquiring the necessary equipment for the space talk last year after they were approached by Belmont Elementary in Langley.

“This was just so, so exciting for us, that we could do this for the schools,” said Charlie Milazzo with LARA. “And actually the Canadian Space Agency representatives were very excited as well when they saw we actually had something we could take and plant anywhere . . . They’re talking about sending us through B.C. with it to do some more schools.”

Tracy Cromwell, director of development and marketing at the H.R. MacMillan, said she hopes talking with an astronaut from the Lower Mainland will help students realize the career is an achievable goal.

"And also just broaden their horizon a little bit on what's happening in space, what kind of things, developments are coming along."

A volunteer-based program called ARISS (Amateur Radio on the International Space Station) was also involved in making the question and answer session possible. The group helps connect students with ISS crew members by radio.

Steve McFarlane with ARISS tries to be on hand during the exchanges, and was with Belmont students during their contact but couldn't be with Tsawwassen students Tuesday. Instead, he watched the exchange live via a webcast (at iss.silverdata.ca) set up by the LARA. He texted the group shortly after.

"Two contacts with the ISS in five days," read Milazzo to the students. "Not sure that's ever been done before."

As the conversation came to a close, Milazzo asked students to say the appropriate thank you and goodbye to those aboard the ISS.

Yelled the group: “Seven-three-I-S-S!”