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Amateur Radio Implications
NYS Legislature Wireless Siting Bill

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Attention All Amateurs...

Canadian Team Takes WRTC-2006 Gold, "Phantom QSOs" Mystery Clouds Event (Jul 14, 2006) -- Canadians John Sluymer, VE3EJ, and Jim Roberts, VE7ZO (ex-VE3IY), officially topped the 46-team field at World Radiosport Team Championship 2006 (WRTC-2006) in Brazil. Operating as PT5M, they logged nearly 2.44 million points (see "WRTC-2006 Final Scores") to take home the gold. US teams took the second and third positions for silver and bronze medals, respectively. But the appearance in one log of a large number of what officials are calling "phantom QSOs" took another team out of medal contention.
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Feature: Antennas are Where You Find Them (Jul 16, 2006) -- When you can't have a "proper" antenna due to space, antenna restrictions or other limitations (such as your spouse!), sometimes you just have to improvise. One enterprising amateur finds places for antennas in places he never even thought of, and in doing so, finds his "super antenna."
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Feature: Surfin': LED Communications over a 104-Mile Path (Jul 14, 2006) -- This week, learn how those LEDs that we take for granted are shining brightly in the communications field.
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ARRL Board of Directors to Meet July 21-22 (Jul 14, 2006) -- The ARRL Board of Directors will gather Friday and Saturday, July 21-22, in Windsor, Connecticut, for its second meeting of 2006. ARRL President Joel Harrison, W5ZN -- who was elected at the January Board meeting -- will preside.
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The K7RA Solar Update (Jul 14, 2006) -- Sunspot numbers and solar flux declined this week. Average daily sunspot numbers dropped 10 points to 25.6, and average solar flux was down by nearly 11 points. There were no remarkable geomagnetic disturbances. July 9 saw a weak solar wind from a coronal mass ejection, followed by another period two days later, but every day the IMF pointed north, protecting Earth's geomagnetic field.
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Catherine Ferry, NC8F, is 2006 Amateur Radio Newsline Young Ham of the Year (Jul 13, 2006) -- For the third year in a row, a young woman has been named to receive the 2006 Amateur Radio Newsline™ Young Ham of the Year Award (YHOTY). Catherine E. Ferry, NC8F -- an 18-year-old from Silver Lake, Ohio -- is this year's winner, Award Administrator Bill Pasternak, WA6ITF, and Award Committee Chairman Mark Abramowicz, NT3V, announced this week.
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"Magic Band" Does its Thing with Spectacular July 12 Opening (Jul 13, 2006) -- Stations in several parts of the US took advantage of a monster opening on 6 meters--the "Magic Band"-- Wednesday, July 12. The Daily DX Editor Bernie McClenny, W3UR, who also edits "How's DX?" for QST, says the band began warming up at his Maryland QTH before sunrise, but the biggest opening occurred just before 2100 UTC.
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What's up with the "Link to this story" link? (Jul 13, 2006) -- Some visitors to the ARRL Web site have wondered about the purpose of the "Link to this story" hyperlink that appears below some news items. This link shows up on brief news items -- which we call "crawlies" -- where the entire story text appears on the news crawl without jumping to a separate story page (longer news and feature items have a "Full Story" link). The "Link to this story" link provides a way to refer to these short news items from other pages of the site or from other Web sites. Since this is a permanent link, it will remain valid after an item has scrolled off the bottom of the current news page. Clicking the link results in a Web page that displays the referenced "crawlie" without surrounding news items, making it more convenient to print out an individual new brief.
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New ISS crew member settling in, school QSOs being lined up (Jul 13, 2006) -- European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut Thomas Reiter, DF4TR, has been settling in as part of the International Space Station Expedition 13 crew. At the ESA's request, the Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) international team is lining up a schedule of school QSOs for Reiter, seen left in photo with crewmates Commander Pavel Vinogradov, RV3BS (center), and Flight Engineer Jeff Williams, KD5TVQ. So far, the schedule calls for Reiter to make his first ARISS contact July 29 with youngsters at an ESA space camp in Greece. Reiter, whose name now appears on the mission logo, joined Expedition 13 earlier this month after arriving aboard the shuttle Discovery, marking the first time since May 2003 that the station has had a three-member crew. Reiter is working on a contract between the ESA and the Russian Federal Space Agency Roscosmos. He'll remain aboard the ISS through part of Expedition 14. The 48-year-old Frankfurt, Germany, native spent 179 days aboard the Russian Mir space station a decade ago. Meanwhile, the ARISS equipment on the ISS has been powered up again after being shut down per standard operating procedure to accommodate this week's three spacewalks (EVAs), and the RS0ISS packet station is active again. The next ARISS school contact is planned for the week of August 7. Mission STS-121 shuttle crew members this week conducted three spacewalks to perform station maintenance and to test on-orbit heat shield repair techniques. Both crews cooperated in transferring cargo this week. Discovery is scheduled to leave the ISS Saturday, July 15, and return to Earth Monday, July 17.
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FCC seeking two telecommunications specialists for monitoring center (Jul 13, 2006) -- The FCC has two openings for telecommunications specialists at its High Frequency Direction Finding Center in Columbia, Maryland. The deadline to apply is August 2, 2006. Interested applicants may review the duties, qualifications and requirements for these positions via the FCCJobs Web-based recruitment system, which electronically qualifies, rates, and ranks applicants. Key requirements include US citizenship and a security clearance as well as drug testing and a background investigation. Shift work is involved. These are full-time, permanent positions in the FCC's Spectrum Enforcement Division. Duties include using radio signal analysis equipment deployed throughout the US to collect, correlate, and analyze the characteristics of radio signals involved in interference problems, distress or safety-related signals or other radio signals involved in other high-priority activities such as law enforcement or national defense. Applicants must have knowledge of communication technology, modulation techniques and transmission practices, including knowledge of radio receiver operation and transmission systems. Specialized experience includes the ability to analyze routine complaints and inquiries, knowledge of investigative techniques and knowledge of HF propagation. The FCC is an equal opportunity employer.
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Feature: You're Just Not a Ham Unless You Build It Yourself (Jul 13, 2006) -- Listen in as one old-timer relates a homebrew story to another.
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MARS members to handle messages for returning troops (Jul 12, 2006) -- Military Affiliate Radio System (MARS) members will handle message traffic for active duty, National Guard and reserve troops back from the Mideast and Europe on Thursday, July 13. That's when Northeastern Pennsylvania's WNEP-TV and Knoebels Amusement Resort stage a veterans' reunion at the resort in Elysburg, Pennsylvania. Army MARS State Director Andrew Shecktor, N3OMA/AAA3PA, conceived idea of providing communication support, and the two event sponsors readily welcomed it, he said. MARSgram service will be available for veterans of service in Kuwait, Iraq, Afghanistan, Bosnia, Kosovo or Germany to greet comrades still in the combat zone as well as those now back in the US and to friends and family members. The day-long commemoration of the veterans' service also will celebrate WNEP's 10^th anniversary. Shektor said Air Force and Navy-Marine Corps MARS members will operate a portable "special event" station, which will utilize Army frequencies for both voice and digital transmission on VHF and HF. For more information, contact Shecktor via e-mail or by calling (570) 752-2434.--Bill Sexton, N1IN
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SKYWARN Busy as Thunderstorms, Large Hail, Flash Flooding Hit New England (Jul 12, 2006) -- An outbreak of severe weather in New England July 11 kept SKYWARN nets in Massachusetts, Connecticut and New Hampshire busy fielding reports of high winds, large hail, flooding and even possible tornadoes. Amateur Radio SKYWARN coordinators assisted with damage assessment well into the evening. More severe weather is forecast for today.
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Free IOTA Contest logger available (Jul 12, 2006) -- A free logging program for the Islands on the Air (IOTA) contest July 29-30 is available from Paul O'Kane, EI5DI. His program, SDI is the only contest logger dedicated to the IOTA event. It also comes recommended in the IOTA Contest rules, for single-operator entrants. SDI is optimized for IOTA. Among other features, it shows the multiplier status of all relevant island groups by country and call area as the operator enters call sign prefixes. It also will autofill the IOTA reference when the call sign appears to correspond to that island group. The program can reference a call sign database of known island operations, extracting the island reference and filling it in automatically. It includes provisions for CW keying. SDI runs under Windows and is intended for single-operator unassisted entries. User assistance is available via e-mail. O'Kane offers other free SD logging software on his Web site.
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Hiroshima Children's Museum Visitors Speak with ISS via Ham Radio (Jul 12, 2006) -- Youngsters visiting Hiroshima Children's Museum in Japan July 4 were among the latest earthlings to have the opportunity to speak via Amateur Radio with the crew of the International Space Station. The Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) program arranged the direct 2-meter contact between 8J4CM at the museum and NA1SS in space. Expedition 13 astronaut Jeff Williams, KD5TVQ, answered 15 of the kids' questions. One youngster wanted to know if it was hard to live in space.
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Amateur Radio ImplicationsNYS Legislature Wireless Siting Bill

Amateur Radio Implications
NYS Legislature Wireless Siting Bill