2020 SEPTEMBER 13 VK NATIONAL NEWS BROADCAST ON VK1WIA ---------------------------------------------------------------------* THE BEST NEWS YOU'LL GET ALL WEEK THIS LINK IS A VIDEO VERSION OF NEWS COMPILED BY VK5BD BEVAN tinyurl.com/WIA-News-Videos ---------------------------------------------------------------------* NATIONAL NEWS FOR WEEK COMMENCING SEPTEMBER 13 2020 IN OUR 25th YEAR OF NON STOP NEWS WORLD WIDE SPECIAL INTEREST GROUP NEWS 5 MHz G 5 MHZ – Remembering Gordon In the UK, the 5 MHz band has been available since 2002. This, UK hams owe to the initiative of Gordon Adams, G3LEQ, at the time Spectrum Director of the Radio Society of Great Britain, who was central to negotiations with the Regulator and the UK Ministry of Defence, the primary user of the band. One of the elements of Gordon’s proposals for use of the band was as a vehicle for countrywide coverage of the GB2RS news bulletin, produced by the RSGB. Gordon became a Silent Key in 2018 and the GB2RS 5 MHz news reading team have looked for a way to actively remember Gordon’s vital contribution. The opportunity arose when Ofcom recently released the G5 + 3 Letter call series. The 5 MHz Newsreaders, as ‘The 5 MHz Pioneers Group’ applied for and received the call G5MHZ. The call G5MHZ is in recognition and remembrance of the work done by Gordon in obtaining a band at 5 Megahertz for UK Radio Amateurs. The callsign? ‘ 5 MHZ’ is obvious and the ‘G’? Well what else could it stand for but Gordon! Look out for G5MHZ on 60 m. (PAUL GASKELL G4MWO) WW SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS --- BALLOONING VLF Balloon with 210m long antenna launches Sept 12 A high-altitude balloon experiment, launched by Warsaw University of Technology, was planned to lift off September 12, carrying a VLF 210-m-long fully-airborne antenna system, transmitting on 14.2 kHz 14.2 kHz is the former frequency of the Babice Radio Station in Poland. The project is delivering very important data for a doctoral dissertation – any and all feedback on the reception of the signal (reception location, SNR, bandwidth etc.) is extremely important; your help with the listening to the transmission would be invaluable! The balloon will also be transmitting APRS on 144.800 MHz FM, callsign SP5AXL. alexander.n.se/grimetons-sister-station-shall-reappear-in-the-stratosphere/?lang=en (SouthGate) WW SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS --- CW FISTS Club - East Asia feacw.net FISTS Club - Australasia fdu.org.au FISTS Club - UK & Europe fists.co.uk FISTS Club - Americas fists.org Recommended FISTS calling frequencies (MHz): 1.808 3.528 7.028 10.118 14.058 18.085 21.058 24.908 28.058 FISTS Log Converter latest version, 4.0.1 for Windows is now available. FISTS Log Converter can be used in conjunction with almost all amateur radio logbook programs or for anyone not currently using one, it includes its own easy-to-use logbook. The program is available from the download web page of FISTS UK fists.co.uk/flc (fdu) WW SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS - FEMALES IN RADIO. Amateur radio featured in a TEDx talk (Pronounced 'Ted Ex') In a TEDx talk entrepreneur Lital Marom recalls that back in the last century when she first attended an amateur radio class she was laughed at because she was female and young, 10 years old. The talk was given at a TEDx event in Amsterdam, in it Lital describes how as we shift from a stable, linear economy to an innovative and dynamic one, we need a new definition of success, and a new approach to learning. Through examples of her own journey and her interesting, personal, and funny take on the business of hacking our world, Lital’s talk explains the idea behind a hacker mindset in developing new young leaders. Watch Morse Code and the Future of Leadership at youtube.com/watch?v=2jdDdY3d8M0 Fortunately much has changed since the era when Lital started her hobby. Not only is the hobby now inclusive but the old Morse exam requirement has been scrapped. (SouthGate) WW SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS - FINAL FRONTIER AMSAT-VK Secretary - secretary@amsat-vk.org The ARISS team is pleased to announce that set up and installation of the first element of the next generation radio system was completed and amateur radio operations with it are now underway. This first element, dubbed the InterOperable Radio System (IORS), was installed in the International Space Station Columbus module. The IORS replaces the Ericsson radio system and packet module that were originally certified for spaceflight on July 26, 2000. Initial operation of the new radio system is in FM cross band repeater mode using an uplink frequency of 145.990 MHz with a CTCSS access tone of 67 Hz and a downlink frequency of 437.800 MHz (SouthGate) A Falcon 9 rocket dodged stormy weather and successfully placed an Argentine radar observation satellite into an orbit over Earth’s poles Sunday on SpaceX’s 100th launch. Instead of launching toward the northeast or east, the Falcon 9 darted through a cloudy sky and arced to the south-southeast from Florida’s Space Coast, then made a right turn to fly along the east coast of Florida over Fort Lauderdale and Miami on the way to a polar orbit. The launch Sunday was the first from Cape Canaveral to fly on a southerly track since 1969. (ANS) A long-retired NASA satellite has burned up in Earth's atmosphere the agency has confirmed. NASA launched the satellite, called Orbiting Geophysics Observatory 1, or OGO-1, in September 1964, the first in a series of five missions to help scientists understand the magnetic environment around Earth. OGO-1 was the first to launch but the last to fall out of orbit; the satellite had circled Earth aimlessly since its retirement in 1971. (ANS) SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS --- SUMMITS ON THE AIR sotawatch.org sota.org.uk O E SOTA Day is a popular annual Summits on the Air event, organised by the Austrian SOTA Association and takes place Saturday September 19. It will be a festival of SOTA activations to mark the end of summer in Europe. The day should offer a very good opportunity for chasers to amass a large number of points and unique summits worked. ---------------------------------------------------------------------* THE QNEWS WORK BENCH - the nuts and volts report – Measure Twice cut Once. Amongst the solder smoke, Clive VK4ACC found this next article in the small newspaper produced on the Capricorn Coast at Yeppoon. This article explains how RADAR CLUB ROCKHAMPTON member Les Mc Donald VK 4 CLF built a replica of a WW2 RADIO called Winnie (original housed at the Australian War Memorial in Canberra). Les had a TV repair business at Yeppoon before retiring and is excellent with his hands making many fine pieces that RADAR club have used on many of their radio club displays. ---------------------------------------------------------------------* HAM RADIO OPERATIONAL NEWS - IT'S A CONTACT SPORT Hi this is Alan VK4SN with Remembrance Day Contest Results. By all accounts the 890 or so participants in the RD had a ball during the 75th anniversary of the event. Conditions were mostly favourable except for a bit of static around on Saturday night due to storms in some areas around the country. It is no surprise that VK7 have taken honours again. Seventy percent of VK7 participants submitted a log. That is 20 percent of the states licenced operators. That has to be a record in anyone’s contest. VK6 came in 2nd with 52 percent of their participants submitting logs followed by VK1 AT 41 percent submission rate. Outstanding efforts indeed. Overall the submission of logs percentages were up in all states. 259 logs were received compared to 182 last year. Congratulations go to the following individuals; SOPH Murray VK7ZMS setting a new Record, SOCW Allan VK2GR SOMX Steve VK5SFA setting a new Record, QRPPH Heath VK3TWO QRPCW Chris VK3QB QPRMX Gerard VK2IO The highest scoring Rookie was won by Tom VK5FAAH with 79 points in the Single Op Phone section. Top Foundation operator was Jeff VK6FJLM with 362 points in the Single Op Phone section. Top Team was Cronies+1 (Richard VK7ZBX, Murray VK7ZMS, Hayden VK7HH) with a score of 2937, beating their own record from last year A full report with all the gory details can be downloaded from the WIA contest page. The report includes the managers’ report, team results, overall results, statistics, operator comments, records since 2012, and golden logs. A new section for this year called Error Log shows where you and other operators made mistakes. Not In Log errors have been omitted due to the excessive number of people who just didn't log a contact. Go figure!. The report is in callsign order for ease of use. Thanks to all the participants, especially those who submitted logs and photos, and to Peter VK1PE for organising the speech. best 73 and see you next year Alan VK4SN -------------- Portable Operations Challenge The challenge is a new kind of HF contest, taking place 2nd and 3rd of October and the aim is to create a level playing field for small portable stations against the large contest stations by using handicapping algorithms similar to that used in golf. Participants choose their own 8-hour contiguous time window within the 48-hour weekend. Find out all you need to know at the link we like foxmikehotel.com/challenge. (rsgb) -------------- OCEANA CONTEST "This is VK7GN for the Oceania DX Contest Committee. This year will see the 75th running of the Oceania Contest which was previously called the VK/ZL Oceania Contest. It all began in 1934 when a contest was run to celebrate 100 years of the founding of Melbourne. In 1935 following the success of this contest another event was organized in cooperation with the New Zealand amateurs and the VK/ZL contest was born. There were no contests during world war two but they returned when it was again possible to operate. For many years the control of the contest was exchanged each year between the WIA and NZART. This did cause some confusion as rules sometimes changed year on year. Eventually a team got together under the leadership of Brian Miller (then ZL1AZE) now VK3MI. Under the overall sponsorship of WIA and NZART the committee of volunteers have managed to get sponsorship for plaques – always room for more! As well as increasing automation of the log checking process so that most entries are now electronic in Cabrillo format. We still accept small log entries by post, less than 50 contacts, but even those are preferred electronically as each mailed log has to be transcribed manually to Cabrillo so it can be included in log checking. A number of logging programs are set up for this contest including the free programs VKCL and N1MM. Log checking and creating lists of results are still very time consuming and we are trying to get the automation working well to speed up the process. Getting plaque trophies to overseas winners is proving a problem under covid restrictions. Many will be unavoidably late for last year’s contest. Please join us again but note the new operating times PHONE: 06:00 UTC Saturday 3rd Oct to 06:00 UTC Sunday 4th Oct 2020 CW: 06:00 UTC Saturday 10th Oct to 06:00 UTC Sunday 11th Oct 2020 Full rules on oceaniadxcontest.com Just exchange signal reports starting at 001 (like 57001) There are awards available for all sorts of operation, low power, QRP, club awards and this year a plaque for the highest scoring YL in Australia. However, the main thing is to have some fun and defy the solar gods who have not been kind to us recently! 73 from Martin VK7GN" AGAIN VOICE from 0600 UTC Saturday October 3 to 0600 UTC Sunday October 4 CW from 0600 UTC Saturday October 10 to 0600 UTC Sunday October 11 -------------- CQ WW DX SSB OCTOBER 24-25 -------------- CQ WW DX CW NOVEMBER 28-29 -------------- December 6 - 8 160 Meter WW -------------- DECEMBER 14 - 15 10 Mtr World Wide -------------- All major AUSTRALIAN contests, rules and results, are on the Contest Section of the WIA website. wia.org.au/members/contests/about *********************** DX WINDOW -------------- DXCC Most Wanted The 'DXCC Most Wanted' entities list has been updated on ClubLog as of September 3 and the list contains 340 entities. In our part of the world high up on the list at 23 is the ZL 9 New Zealand Subantarctic Islands whilst at number 12, VK 0 M Macquarie Island. No surprise still at number one is. P5 DPRK (North Korea) (opdx) -------------- Members of the Bulgarian Radio Club are on the wireless with special call LZ 59 5IP during the month of September to honour the memory of Orthodox saints. QSL via the bureau. (ARNewsLine) -------------- Special call sign 9 H 3 SAT is in Malta throughout September. HF bands and 6 meters as well as the QO-100 satellite using CW and SSB. Send QSLs to his home call DL 2 AAZ (ARNewsLine) -------------- 9 M 63 MJ is special event callsign for the 63rd Malaysia Independence Day Celebrations and is on air until- 16 September 2020 QRV on 10m-80m in CW, SSB and Digital. (SouthGate) -------------- Saudi Arabian special event Members of the Saudi Amateur Radio Society will be active as HZ 90 ND to celebrate the 90th anniversary of their National Day of the Unification of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (September 23rd) between September 17-25th. (opDX) -------------- Battle of Britain 80th Anniversary Royal Air Force Amateur Radio Society (RAFARS) members will operate GB 80 BOB, a special event call sign for the 80th anniversary of The Battle of Britain between the 1st and 28th of September. Operation will be on all bands, as conditions allow, SSB and CW. A special QSL card is available. Details are at rafars.org/GB80BOB/ and QRZ.com (SouthGate) -------------- NETHERLANDS. Special event station PD 538 RNI is QRV until September 30 to commemorate Radio Northsea International and Radio Veronica. From June 1971 until the end of August 1974 Radio North Sea International was a regular and reliable broadcaster from international waters, four miles from the coast of the Netherlands. The main MW transmissions at about 50 kW on 1367 kHz, and 557 kHz (539 metres), announced as 538. QSL via PD 0 ARI. Oh and their theme? 'Les Reed's rendition of "Man Of Action".' -------------- GREECE QRV is SX 1 AFM from September 1 to 30 celebrating 70 years of the Hellenic Air Force History Museum, the station is on all modes 80 through 6 meters. QSL via qrz.com information. (arrl) -------------- ARUBA. Members of the Aruba Amateur Radio Club will be QRV with special event call P 42 WW this month of September to commemorate the end of World War II. QSL via P 4 1G. (arrl) ---------------------------------------------------------------------* INTERNATIONAL NEWS With thanks to IARU, RSGB, SARL, Southgate AR Club, ARRL, RAC, NZART AMATEUR RADIO NEWSLINE & the World Wide sources of the WIA. WRC23 preparations across the Regional Telecommunications Organisations. For a number of years preparations for ITU World Radiocommunication Conferences (WRCs) have been conducted in recognised Regional Telecommunication Organisations (RTOs) These organisations permit participation in each other’s WRC preparatory committees. Our zone or region is ITU Region 3 and comprises the Asia Pacific region, the APT. The 26th Meeting of the APT Wireless Group (AWG-26) is set for this Monday, 14 September 2020 running, via ZOOM till Friday September 18. The 1st Meeting of the APT Conference Preparatory Group for World Radiocommunication Conference 2023 (APG23-1) again by ZOOM is from 24 to 25 September 2020. The objective of the APG23-1 is to initiate the preparatory process of the APT for the World Radiocommunication Conference 2023 (WRC-23) and Radiocommunication Assembly 2023 (RA-23). The APG23-1 is expected to: Elect the Chairman and Vice-Chairmen of the preparatory group; Form the structure of the preparatory group; Nominate other Office Bearers of the preparatory group based on the structure; Develop a tentative work plan for the preparation of RA-23 and WRC-23 USA Researchers at the Air Force Research Laboratory in New Mexico have discovered a new way to track and characterize sporadic E, which occurs when large structures of dense plasma form naturally in the upper atmosphere. “Previous methods to observe these structures were insufficient for identifying and tracking the structures over large regions,” said Ken Obenberger, a research physicist at AFRL The new method, developed by Obenberger and collaborators at AFRL and the University of New Mexico, leverages unintentional RF emissions from power lines, and, using broadband radio noise they can map and track dense sporadic-E structures. “Since power lines are widespread, we can observe sporadic E over a very large region surrounding our observatory, the Long Wavelength Array, an asset of our collaborators at the University of New Mexico,” Obenberger said. “This technique could be used anywhere in the world where there is an electrical grid and an instrument similar to the LWA.” Arnold Spielberg is known as the father of filmmaker Steven Spielberg but on the air, many knew him through the years as W 8 IDX or W 9 AUM. Like his notable son, this father had big dreams that led him to professional prominence. For Arnold Spielberg, most of those dreams began with amateur radio. He became a Silent Key at the ripe old age of 103 on August 25th. Bluetooth beacon offers a massive 32km range With a range 20 times longer than the nearest competitor, the Bluetooth beacon from Apptricity Corporation in Texas can track equipment coming in or going out of building sites. A new ultra-long-range Bluetooth beacon from Apptricity is the longest-ranging secure connection on the market, with the ability to transmit data up to 32km. It is being used in the construction industry. Tim Garcia, CEO of Apptricity said "Many global customers were struggling with the costs of tracking their expensive on-site equipment, as well as all of the vehicles coming in and out of projects. The cost of satellite tags or LTE tags becomes prohibitive, especially with all of the equipment that needs to be tracked." "One of the first customers, Endeavor, has sites outside of LTE coverage, and couldn't afford the cost of satellites. The Apptricity system turned out to be 90% less than their alternatives," he said. The ultra-long-range Bluetooth beacon is also highly configurable. Versions can be created with or without GPS, multiple battery options exist to extend life, encryption options are available, the signal can be tuned for energy savings, and other capabilities can be adjusted to create a bespoke enterprise system. apptricity.com eenewsembedded.com/news/bluetooth-beacon-offers-massive-32km-range?news_id=131381 BRAZIL Graham VK4BB has filed this AMAZING article for ARNewsLine which we bring you here..now. "Taking the Brazilian Amateur Radio League by surprise, the nation's regulator, the Brazilian National Telecommunications Agency, has proposed eliminating the amateur radio certificate exam for ALL classes. Regulator ANATEL's published proposal outlines a structure that would grant free access to the Class C licence, which would align the process with that used for citizens band radio. The regulator is proposing advancement to subsequent classes B and A after the applicant presents a certificate of completion for technical classes in communications - or a minimum of three years' instruction. ANATEL has requested support from the Brazilian radio group LABRE, which is a strong proponent of minimum requirements for a radio amateur licence. The regulator's move also contradicts most practices in the international regulation of licences. LABRE has asked for a meeting with the regulator to clarify the proposal." In addition, the aforementioned proposal suggests ending the rules of different prefixes for each of the States of the Federation, remaining only the prefix per class and there would no longer be any special callsigns. --------------------------------------------------------------------* Due to the COVID-19 situation, please check these events' direct for up-to-date status information. 2021 VK4 - TARC Australia Day Long Week Family Radio Camp Thursday afternoon 21st to Tuesday afternoon 26th January at Girl Guides Association of Queensland Campsite and Training Centre Bluewater. (vk4zz) VK2 - WYONG FIELD DAY (tentative) February 28 ( vk4zz) VK - ALARAMEET 2021 Bendigo VK3 October 1 - 4 (vk5yl) VK7 - VK7 biennial HamFest Miena Community Hall (vk7tw) 2020 Miena QSO Muster Saturday October 24th VK4 - Rockhampton Amateur Radio Annual Dinner Sat Nov 21 (tarc) VK4 - TARC Xmas Party - Sun 13th December from 2pm (tarc) VK4 - TARC Xmas Lights Tour - Fri 18th December from 7pm (tarc) VK4 - CHARC AGM Lake Maraboon, 25 to 27 September. (vk4zz) SOCIAL DISTANCING KEEP ONE WAVELENGTH AWAY AT 144 Megacycles FINAL FINAL Reception Reports WIA News rebroadcasters often give Short Wave Listeners a welcome to the broadcast as they commence call-backs straight after the Local News. Local news follows the National news in all states. It would be great if those SWL's would email their reception reports and location to callbacks@wia.org.au Submitting news items If you would like to submit news items for possible inclusion in the VK1WIA broadcasts, please email your item in text to nationalnews@wia.org.au and don't JUST send url's links or posters, but take the time to pen YOUR contribution. To submit audio email nationalnews@wia.org.au and ask for the current password then read "how to submit items" in the weekly news page on wia.org.au/members/broadcast/contribute/ We would appreciate items certainly no longer than 1.5 minutes in length as we only have a half hour. Remember the sooner you submit material the more the likelihood of it being broadcast in the very next edition of WIA National News. Each item will only be broadcast once, if you want a couple of mentions, please submit different slants to keep your event 'fresh' and always if the news room is to read your item --- write it in the 3rd person. (First if YOU are reading your own item) A reminder when supplying HamFest info we obviously can't plug DEALS from commercial traders "on air", but we at the WIA will put your supporters 'goods' in this text edition "no worries." We cannot give blatant 'plugs' to raffles. vk1wia-broadcasters@lists.wia.org.au ---------------------------------------------------------------------* Oh... and to contact us with your news because If It Matters To You It Matters To Us! Email nationalnews@wia.org.au and for audio wia.org.au click news in member area Please... If you are only submitting text and not audio, NEVER send just links & url's but write your story as you would expect to hear it being read back. Click the links below to download the most recent edition of National News, BUT this is ONLY the backup site! WIANEWS backup thanks to Brendan VK4BLP can be found on wiaq.org.au BACKUPS OF THE BACKUP!! thanks to Tony VK7AX www.vk7ax.id.au/wianews/ wia.org.au/members/broadcast/wianews/ (This is the link to the original text version and original audio on wia site) ===================================================================== WIANews - we've reported...YOU decide. TWITTER twitter.com/VK1WIA Societies and Club News Letter Editors can EXCHANGE a feed prior to the actual broadcast date, e-mail nationalnews@wia.org.au Call-backs follow the RF editions, but also for text readers you may lodge a quick reply to let us know you read it, who knows, you might even get a "cheerio call". Thanks to our dedicated band of broadcast volunteers who utilize their time and equipment in bringing you this weekly broadcast. Who and where are they? wia.org.au/members/broadcast/where/ The purpose of "WIANews" is to rapidly provide news of interest to WIA affiliated clubs and active amateurs residing in Australia and the globe. We strongly encourage membership in the Wireless Institute of Australia and participation in the activities of local clubs. Opinions expressed in "WIANews" are those of the writers who submit material and do not necessarily reflect those of the rebroadcasters, nor the National WIA, but IF broadcast, are done so in the spirit in which they were submitted." Material may be reproduced in whole or in part, in any form, a credit to WIANews wouldn't go astray... If you would like to see the call-backs reported each broadcast, OR have call-backs to contribute to the National News call back tally then please send through your call-backs to callbacks@wia.org.au How do I join this National News List? (subscribe for an automatic weekly feed.) Email to vk1wia-news-join@lists.wia.org.au from the email account that you wish the emails to go to. How do I leave this National News List? (unsubscribe your weekly feed) Open mail program which sends mail from the address you want to unsubscribe from. Send unsubscribe to the list unsubscribe address vk1wia-news-leave@lists.wia.org.au You will be sent a confirmation mail and must follow the instructions given in that mail to complete the unsubscription. Once your unsubscription has been processed, you will probably receive another message confirming your unsubscription from the list, and at that point you should stop receiving messages. ---------------------------------------------------------------------*