CQ Amateur Radio December 2022

DECEMBER ARCHBOLD, OHIO — The Fulton County Amateur Radio Club will hold Winterfest 2022 from 8-11 a.m., Saturday, December 3 at the Ruihley Park Pavilion, 320 W. Holland Street. Contact: Bryan Patterson, KB8ELG, (419) 250-6694. Email: <kb8elg@hotmail.com>. Website: <http://k8bxq.org>. Talk-in 147.195+. OCALA, FLORIDA — The Silver Springs Radio Club will hold its 2022 Hamfest beginning 7:30 a.m., Saturday, December 3 at the First Christian Church, 1908 East Fort King Street. Website: <www.k4gso.us/hamfest>. Talk-in 146.610 (PL 123). VE exams. VERO BEACH, FLORIDA — The Vero Beach Amateur Radio Club will hold the Treasure Coast Hamfest from 7:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., Saturday, December 3 at the Indian River County Fairgrounds, 7955 58th Avenue. Email: <tresurecoasthamfest@gmail.com>. Website: <http://treasurecoasthamfest.com>. Talk-in 146.640. VE exams. TROY, MICHIGAN — The L’anse Creuse Amateur Radio Club will hold its 49thAnnual Swap…

FCC Plans to Establish Space Bureau FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel announced plans in early November to reorganize the commission’s structure to create a new Space Bureau to consolidate all activities related to satellites. Under the plan, the International Bureau will have its satellite-related responsibilities transferred to the new Space Bureau and will be reconfigured as a standalone Office of International Affairs, modeled after the current Office of Engineering and Technology (OET) and Office of General Counsel. The Space Bureau will also deal with domestic satellite matters. It is unclear how or whether this change in FCC bureau structure will impact the Amateur Satellite Service. The FCC did not release a timetable for making these changes. IARU Holds Virtual General Assembly For the first time in its history, Region 2 of the International Amateur…

Football call? Nope. Winning Powerball numbers? I wish … Contest exchange? Yes, and one that made me very happy to hear. When I turned my rig on around noon on Saturday of the CQWW DX Contest SSB weekend, I was greeted by dozens of stations reporting “5-9, 14,” meaning (for non-contesters) that I had a strong signal (5-by-9) into Western Europe (CQ Zone 14). Now, there’s generally nothing especially unusual about that. In fact, if you look at last month’s Contesting column, you’ll see that Tim, N3QE, has determined that Zone 14 is the most commonly reported zone in the CQWW. In addition, contacts between Zone 14 and Zone 5 (my zone) were the second-most commonly reported. So what made these Zone 14 stations special? They were on 10 meters, which has…

An institution among DXers has been shut down after nearly 32 years. Ohio-Penn DX Bulletin founder and editor/publisher Tedd Mirgliotta, KB8NW, announced his retirement in the October 31st (and final) edition of the bulletin. Since 1991, the OPDX Bulletin has been providing DXers with regular updates on DXpeditions, planned activations by operators in rare locations, and other news of interest to DXers. The bulletin was always offered at no cost to the reader. In his retirement message, Mirgliotta noted that he had actually been providing DX information to hams for over 40 years, pioneering the use of computer communication and packet radio to do so, “starting on a local RTTY BBS, Packet Radio BBS and an online dial-up BBS called BARF80 (which received global phone calls before adding the internet to…

Hurricane Ian slammed into the west coast of Florida in late September and left behind a trail of death and destruction second only to Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The ham radio response during and immediately after the storm was covered in our November news column. But recovery takes a much longer time and hams continue to play a role (although not always with their radios). We share two stories with you here, one of a group of hams from the Miami area helping fellow hams in Fort Myers, and a first-person story by a member of the CQ “family” about getting back on the air after the storm destroyed most of his antennas. – W2VU Several members of QCWA (Quarter Century Wireless Association) Chapter 147 in the Florida Keys purchased many,…

I am writing this article 14 days after surviving the “storm of the century” in southwest Florida. On Tuesday, September 27th, word from the National Hurricane Center was that Hurricane Ian was aiming its wrath at our hometown of Port Charlotte. The storm would come ashore as a category 4, bordering on 5! “Oh my God! We are at ground zero!” I told my XYL, Ruthie, K4KLQ. “They are predicting a 16-foot storm surge.” Our home is on a waterway just off Charlotte Harbor and with only 8 feet of elevation above the water, we just knew that we would be doomed. Our home and all our possessions would be underwater. Evacuation was mandatory. # Former CQ QRP Editor Email: <w4dnnradio@gmail.com> We immediately got into the car and, with our pre-packed suitcase and a…