At the 2010 Dayton Hamvention®, the International Amateur Radio Union (IARU) and the ARRL sponsored a game that involved searching for hams visiting from outside the USA. According to ARRL Membership and Volunteer Programs Manager Dave Patton, NN1N, the idea was to obtain calls and names from as many different DXCC entities (from outside the USA) as possible by making “eyeball QSOs” during the ...

The North Texas Microwave Society (NTMS) will host the 14th International EME Conference in Dallas, Texas on August 12-14. This is the first time the conference has been held in the US since 2004. Whether you are an experienced EMEer or new to EME, the conference will offer a wide range of technical, social and site-seeing activities. Gerald Youngblood, K5SDR, President and Chief Executive Offi...

The Atlantic hurricane season could be the busiest since 2005, when Katrina and Rita caused massive destruction along the same part of the Gulf Coast now struggling with the largest offshore oil spill in US history, government scientists with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) said last week. According to NOAA’s predictions, the 2010 season may spawn as many as 23 named ...

Bernard Joseph “Burt” Amero, VE1AMA of Auburn, Nova Scotia, Canada, passed away Tuesday, May 25, after a long battle with cancer. He was 67. Burt was known worldwide as the founder of “Network 105”. Established in 1986, Network 105 is a global packet radio network that is active today on 14.105 MHz. Burt was also quite active in various public service functions through the years. Online condole...

This weekend is the CQ WPX CW Contest and conditions may be a little rough. Our current sunspot group 1072 has reached the Sun’s western horizon and is shrinking, and to top it all off, what looked like a possible emerging spot on Wednesday was not to be.

There is a stiff solar wind heading toward Earth, and the predicted planetary A index for May 28-31 is 20, 20, 22 and 15. The predicted solar ...

By Stan Horzepa, WA1LOU
Contributing Editor
May 28, 2010

This week, Surfin’ kicks the tires on a cool new online HF propagation tool.

Jari Perkiömäki, OH6BG, wrote that VOACAP Online, a Web-based propagation prediction application, is now up and running and making HF propagation predictions between any two points on the globe. (VOACAP is arguably one of the best HF prediction engines available toda...

Last month, New Zealand’s Radio Spectrum Management (RSM) -- that country’s equivalent of the FCC -- charged and fined Alan Potter, ZL3II, of Christchurch, for transmitting outside the terms and conditions of the General User Radio License for Amateur Radio Operators. Potter was charged in the Christchurch District Court on April 14 and found guilty of breaching Section 113 of the Radiocommunic...

Last month, New Zealand’s Radio Spectrum Management (RSM) -- that country’s equivalent of the FCC -- charged and fined Alan Potter, ZL3II, of Christchurch, for transmitting outside the terms and conditions of the General User Radio License for Amateur Radio Operators. Potter was charged in the Christchurch District Court on April 14 and found guilty of breaching Section 113 of the Radiocommunic...

Bob Brown, NM7M, of Anacortes, Washington, passed away Sunday, May 23, from cardiac arrest. He was 87. Brown, the husband of former ARRL Northwestern Division Director Mary Lou Brown, NM7N (SK), was known worldwide for his contributions to the propagation studies on 160 meters. Brown wrote 12 articles for the ARRL from 1998-2001 that appeared in QST, QEX and NCJ, most of them -- such as this De...

Many hams have long complained about difficulties they have encountered when purchasing International Reply Coupons (IRCs) from their local post offices. Now the US Postal Service (USPS) has made it easier to get those IRCs to send with your direct QSL cards -- order them online from the USPS Web site. The USPS ships all in-stock domestic orders for stamps and retail items within 1 business day...

Lonnie L. Keeney, KB9RFO, of Greencastle, Indiana, filed a Petition for Reconsideration in March 2010, asking that the FCC re-evaluate the revocation of his Amateur Radio license. Keeney -- who in 2002 was convicted of child molestation, a Class C felony -- was found by the FCC in February 2010 to be “lack[ing] the requisite character qualifications to be and remain a Commission licensee.” Keen...

Bill Cross, W3TN, a staff member in the FCC’s Mobility Division -- part of the Wireless Telecommunications Bureau -- spoke at the FCC Forum on Saturday morning at the 2010 Dayton Hamvention®. Billed by the Hamvention’s Forum Committee as more of an emergency communications discussion, Cross discussed this and other matters -- such as FCC proceedings regarding vanity and club call signs, 60 mete...

An informal network of ham radio experimenters, scientists and CW enthusiasts called FlyVenusCom -- a nonprofit, cross-cultural effort -- has been created to support communication efforts by Japanese scientists with its CubeSat Venus probe, UNITEC-1.

UNITEC-1 was developed by 20 universities of the University Space Engineering Consortium (UNISEC), the Japanese community developing nano-satellite...

Just as many vendors release new products at the Dayton Hamvention, the ARRL will debut much-anticipated publications. This year was no exception. Two new books -- Remote Operating for Amateur Radio and the third edition of The ARRL RFI Book -- were introduced.

Remote Operating for Amateur Radio shows amateurs how to assemble their own Internet-controlled station. As many hams are discovering, i...

After a hiatus of nearly four months, the ARRL Audio News is scheduled to return Thursday, May 27. With the advent of the new ARRL Web site, we have had to make some changes in the way the Audio News is presented. For the time being, it will only be available as one mp3 file; we will no longer be breaking it up into segments. In addition, we will not be able to offer the Audio News via telephon...

The Question Pool Committee (QPC) of the National Conference of Volunteer Examiner Coordinators (NCVEC) announced the withdrawal of two questions from the Technician class pool and two questions from the Extra class pool. Volunteer Examiner Coordinators (VECs) and Volunteer Examiners (VEs) must take action to remove these questions from use by July 1, 2010. Due to a rules change and pending act...

Through an agreement between the South African Radio League (SARL) and the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa, those radio amateurs who will be attending the FIFA World Cup in South Africa may use a special ZS call sign during the event. SARL is South Africa’s IARU Member-Society.

After registering with SARL prior to arrival in South Africa, hams may attach ZS10 to the front of...

The Japanese UNITEC-1 space probe has been successfully launched and is now beginning its mission to the planet Venus. What makes this mission of particular interest to amateurs is the fact that the UNITEC engineers have added a 5 GHz Amateur Radio beacon to the spacecraft and they are encouraging hams to attempt to receive it.

On May 21 Japanese ground stations reported receiving the CW and FS...