Blackjack Filmaffinity - Info! - Grosvenor Casino Newcastle Jobs
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Blackjack Filmaffinity - Info! - Grosvenor Casino Newcastle Jobs
The Condenser SUNSET EMPIRE AMATEUR RADIO CLUB V O L U M E 1 2 I S S U E 1 2 D E C E M B E R 2 0 1 2 BOARD ELECTION RESULTS EOC ACTIVATED BOARD ELECTION RESULTS Part of my duties as your intrepid editor of The Condenser is to monitor the international news wires for stories related to amateur radio. At our November membership meeting we held an election for members of the Board. I was pleasantly surprised when I saw a local story about local hams on the international news wire on the 20th of November. It seems that the story in The Daily A was picked up by the news wire company and flashed around the world. The Daily Astorian reports on the part played by radio amateurs Don Hillgaertner WA7TEM and Frank Van Winkle KD7NNQ during a recent flood alert. The newspaper reports that by Monday morning Clatsop County’s Emergency Management Division had partially activated its Emergency Operating Center on the fourth floor of the county building in Astoria. High winds were registering up and down the coast and it soon became apparent that nearby river flooding might be a real possibility. Story continues on page The following members were elected for 2013: President — Jim Santee Vice President — Doug Rund Treasurer — Pat Haggard No member was nominated via the by-law defined nomination process for the position of Secretary. We did have a number of write-ins for Secretary. We contacted those members and all but one declined the position. Don Webb received one write-in vote and advised the Board that he was willing to serve if we could find someone else to take the minutes at the meetings. We will keep you informed via email regarding which way the Secretary position goes and how we might handle the taking of the minutes. Our by-laws do not speak to this issue so we will be breaking new ground as we handle this issue. If you can offer any suggestions for this process we would love to hear your thoughts. Email us at: [email protected] OREGON REP WALDEN ON COMMUNICATIONS COMMITTEE Newly re-elected Oregon Representative Greg Walden, W7EQI, says he will remain chairman of the House Subcommittee that oversees communications and technology policy. This as the former radio station group owner is being promoted within the Republican party leadership in Congress. In addition to his other duties, W7EQI will chair the National Republican Congressional Committee. Elected to the post by House GOP members, the National Republican Congressional Committee chairman works with House leadership to set the agenda of that body. The committee also coordinates national efforts to elect Republicans to the House. PAGE 2 CW…..CW…..CW…. How Do You….. Just how do you send an @ sign or a % sign in Morse Code? I do not see either one on the chart above. Do you? Many of those proficient in Morse might be stumped when it comes to sending @ or %, fortunately the ITU-R recommendation on International Morse Code provides an answer. The ITU Radiocommunication Sector (ITU-R) is one of the three sectors (divisions or units) of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and is responsible for radio communication. Recommendation ITU-R M.1677-1 (10/2009) confirms the International Morse code characters and the operational provisions applying to their use in radiocommunication services. The Morse code for @ is .– – .– . For the percentage sign % there is no corresponding signal in the Morse code and they recommend that the figure 0, the fraction bar and the figure 0 shall be transmitted successively. A whole number, a fractional number, or a fraction, followed by a % sign, shall be transmitted by joining up the whole number, the fraction number, or the fraction to the % by a single hyphen. For 2% you would transmit 2-0/0 The ITU-R International Morse Code Recommendation M.1677-1 (10/2009) can be downloaded in Word or PDF format from: http://www.itu.int/rec/R-REC-M.1677-1-200910-I/en Other ITU-R M Series Recommendations are available at: http://www.itu.int/rec/R-REC-M/en VOLUME 12 ISSUE PAGE 12 EOC Activated By TED SHORACK The Daily Astorian By Monday morning Clatsop County’s Emergency Management Division had partially activated its Emergency Operating Center on the fourth floor of the county building in Astoria. High winds were registering up and down the coast and it soon became apparent that nearby river flooding might be a real possibility. Emergency Management Coordinator Tiffany Brown received phone calls from her cellphone and county phone lines, gathering updates about Providence Seaside Hospital, which ran on a generator after its power went out and it canceled elective surgeries. Other calls reported incidents of road closures and power outages. The partial activation of the EOC notifies state government that additional first-responders may be needed if the situation worsens, or as Brown put it, the storm would have to “put to the test local resources.” Oregon counties have a mutual-aid agreement, meaning that outlying counties can be contacted in the event of a full activation of the EOC to support the local resources that are exhausted. The partial activation entails letting these outside emergency resources know ahead of time. Brown described it as putting them “actively on stand-by.” Ham radio volunteer Frank Van Winkle monitored updates through radios in the adjacent room from Brown. Since the Great Coastal Gale of 2007, the use of ham radios has become more prominent in communicating with other government officials and emergency personnel in case phone lines are down. It was their use in Clatsop County during the 2007 storm that led to their more widespread use in the state, according to Don Hillgaertner, another volunteer ham radio operator with the county. At 11:30 a.m., the three person Emergency Management Division assembled in the county office conference room to get an update from National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. On the conference call, emergency service personnel from nearby counties were on the line. Of concerns made by NOAA were possible floods affecting the North Coast region and down into the mid-Willamette Valley. The agency forecasted 4 to 9.5 inches would fall on the Coast Range over the next few days and it was expecting 45 to 55 mph winds to continue on the coast until 8 p.m. Monday. Another possibility was the potential for landslides because of heavy rainfall. In the future, the EOC will operate from a new building at Camp Rilea, which is scheduled to be completed in the spring. In 2007, it operated from the county jail and is now at the county offices. As the afternoon wore on, Hillgaertner and Van Winkle continued to log data collected from other volunteer ham radio operators in the area. Both are part of the Amateur Radio Emergency Service. Their counterparts have weather stations at their places of residence and can be in rural parts of the county or surrounding counties and submit information to the National Weather Service. Many have experience in careers during U.S. Coast Guard days or the Merchant Marine, operating such equipment which they now own. © 2012 Daily approval of The Astorian. All rights reserved. Reprinted Daily Astorian. with the 3 PAGE 4 Visual Morse Code From Space Morse message beacon may well be visible from Earth with the unaided eye well before the scheduled transmission date. FITSAT-1 cubesat is on-line at: FITSAT-1 is a CubeSat that was developed by students at the Fukuoka Institute of Technology in Japan. In addition to system the bird carries a CW beacon on 437.250 MHz and a data link on 437.445 MHz. According to JA6AVG, the There is also a 5.8 GHz data students plan to start testing downlink. the optical system at the end of November. As such its Further information about the Check the Cannon Beach Amateur Radio Society website for pass predictions at: www.cbars.net There will be a Christmas present of sorts from ham radio in space. On December 24th which is Christmas Eve the students in Japan who built the FITSAT-1 satellite are planning to activate the birds LED –optical array and flash a message in Morse Code to those of us here on mother Earth. tinyurl.com/fitsat-christmassignal. (FITSAT-1 Team) Thank you Scott Sperley (WA7SS) President of CBARS. Russia/U.S. ISS Cooperation Russian Cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko, RN3BF, of the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos) and NASA Astronaut Scott Kelly have been selected for a one-year mission aboard the International Space Station (ISS) in 2015. According to NASA, the mission will include collecting scientific data important to future human exploration of our solar system and to understand better how the human body reacts and adapts to the harsh environment of space as NASA plans for missions around the Moon, an asteroid and ultimately Mars. Kelly and Kornienko will launch aboard a Russian Soyuz spacecraft from Kazakhstan in spring 2015 and will return to Kazakhstan in in the spring of 2016. Kelly and Kornienko already have a connection; Kelly was a backup crew member for the Expedition 23/24 crews on the ISS where Kornienko served as a flight engineer. Both men will begin a two-year training program in the United States, Russia and other partner nations starting in early 2013. Kelly, a Captain in the US Navy, is from Orange, New Jersey. He has degrees from the State University of New York Maritime College and the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. He served as a Pilot on space shuttle mission STS103 in 1999, Commander on STS-118 in 2007, Flight Engineer on the ISS Expedition 25 in 2010 and Commander of Expedition 26 in 2011. Kelly has logged more than 180 days in space Kornienko is from the Syzran, Kuibyshev region of Russia. He is a former paratrooper officer and graduated from the Moscow Aviation Institute as a specialist in airborne systems. He has worked in the space industry since 1986 when he worked at Rocket and Space Corporation-Energia as a Spacewalk Handbook Specialist. He was selected as an Energia Test Cosmonaut Candidate in 1998 and trained as an ISS Expedition 8 backup crew member. Kornienko served as a Flight Engineer on the ISS Expedition 23/24 crews in 2010 and has logged more than 176 days in space. VOLUME 12 ISSUE PAGE 12 Wanna Talk To The ISS? Fill Out An Appl. NASA is now accepting proposals from US schools, museums, science centers and community youth organizations -- individually or working together -- to host an Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) contact between May 1, 2013 and November 1, 2013. To maximize these radio contact opportunities, NASA is looking for organizations that will draw large numbers of participants and integrate the contact into a well-developed education plan. Radio contacts are approximately 10 minutes in length. ARISS contacts are supported by the program’s US partners -- the ARRL and AMSAT -- and their member volunteers, as well as other international space agencies and Amateur Radio partners. Proposals are due January 28, 2013. groups who are considering submitting an ARISS proposal. Access to the Internet and a telephone line are required to connect to a session. Information on how to sign up for these sessions is available on the ARRL and NASA websites. Interested parties can visit the ARRL website or the NASA Teaching From Space website for information about proposal requirements and how to submit a proposal, as well as links to audio and video of archived contacts. Five information sessions are also available for Big Ham Radio Doins’ In China Big amateur radio changes ahead for ham radio in China. Jim Meachen, ZL2BHF, reports from down-under: Now clubs and individuals will have their own call signs throughout the world's most populated country. According to word from Jim Linton, VK3PC, mandatory membership of the Chinese Radio Sports Association will likely soon be a thing of the past. This as China moves forward under soon to be announced new amateur service regulations. Also being considered for emergency communications is a new error-correcting low power data mode for HF radio using Chinese characters, a Software Defined Radio receiver network for noisy locations, an alarm system, VHF and UHF repeaters and overall training. For the past 30 years, only a sports organization could transmit on the amateur Radio bands. That began on the 29th of March, 1982 with the station BY1PK, at first on CW and with limited spectrum made available for ham radio operations. But this is 2012 and the old system of someone first being a member of a sport-related body before entering amateur radio no longer works and will end. Along with the revised regulations will be a new entity called the Chinese Radio Amateur Club, that will be solely focused on amateur radio. The new group will deal with the regulations including visitor licenses, conduct exams and licensing, create band plans, allow nation -wide mobile operation, develop emergency communications infrastructure, amateur satellites, and work with the International Amateur Radio Union. When enacted, these revised regulations promise to bring China more in line with the rest of amateur radio service regulations world wide. As such don't be too surprised to hear many more mainland China stations on the ham bands once the new rules do take effect. In 2011 the official population of China was 1,344,130,000. That is a lot of potential amateur radio operators to train. I wonder if and when Jeff, Roxy and Hal will be going over to do ham classes? 5 PAGE 6 Steven Spielberg's 'Lincoln' Hams make it real. Members of the Morse Telegraph Club, an association of retired railroad and commercial telegraphers, historians, radio amateurs and others with an interest in the history and traditions of telegraphy and the telegraph industry played an important role in the production of 'Lincoln.' According to James Wades (WB8SIW), International President of the Morse Telegraph Club, several members provided period telegraph instruments for use in the construction of the War Department Set. Most notably, Tom Perera (W1TP), Derek Cohn (WB0TUA), Kevin Saville (N7JKD), and Roger Reinke provided sufficient telegraph instruments to equip the sixteen operating positions portrayed at the War Department. Jim Wilson (K4BAV) and his son, Matt Wilson had minor roles as Extras. Jim also worked with production staff and the actors to explain telegraph technology and the role of the telegrapher. Jim Wades (WB8SIW) who was employed as a Technical Advisor for the production, worked with set designers over a period of months to develop the War Department telegraph scenes. Mr. Wades coordinated the process of procuring the necessary instruments and served as a historical consultant as the telegraph scenes were developed. Nine of the sixteen telegraph positions depicted in the War Department were fully operational. These instruments could be operated in any combination through the use of a specialized computer program and terminal units custom built by Mr. Wades for the process. When necessary, a hand key could be inserted in the individual telegraph loops so messages could be improvised. Mr. Wades worked with the producers to develop historically appropriate message traffic that fit the sequence of the script. However, as the movie was edited, the final product evolved into a more generic facsimile of Morse traffic. However, those with a background in land line telegraphy will hear the occasional snippet of message traffic in the audio track of the movie. "We are very pleased that Mr. Spielberg and his staff took the time to treat the telegraph with dignity and respect," said Mr. Wades. "It is a pleasure to be associated with a high quality motion picture that can genuinely be classified as not just entertainment, but as a work of art," he added. Article continues on the next page. VOLUME 12 ISSUE PAGE 12 Lincoln Movie, Cont’d The Morse Telegraph Club was founded in 1943 to perpetuate the knowledge, history and traditions of telegraphy. Chapters are located throughout the United States and Canada. Members are actively involved in a variety of projects including presenting talks on the history of telegraphy to historical societies, schools, and Amateur Radio organizations. Chapters throughout the US and Canada have worked with public museums to build historically correct telegraph exhibits. Members also regularly demonstrate telegraphy at historical events throughout North America. Complete coverage of the making of the telegraph scenes in "Lincoln" will be published in an upcoming issue of "Dots and Dashes," the official journal of the Morse Telegraph Club. International President, Morse Telegraph Club, Inc. 269-650-0215 [email protected] http:// www.morsetelegraphclub.org/ For more information or interviews, please contact: Increasing Efficiency of Wireless Networks (www.ucr.edu) Two professors at the University of California, Riverside Bourns College of Engineering have developed a new method that doubles the efficiency of wireless networks and could have a large impact on the mobile Internet and wireless industries. Efficiency of wireless networks is key because there is a limited amount of spectrum to transmit voice, text and Internet services, such as streaming video and music. And when spectrum does become available it can fetch billions of dollars at auction. The “spectrum crunch” is quickly being accelerated as customers convert from traditional cell phones to smartphones and tablets. For example, tablets generate 121 times more traffic than a traditional cell phone. Without making networks more efficient, customers are likely to drop more calls, pay more money for service, endure slower data speed and not see an unlimited data plan again. The UC Riverside findings were outlined in a paper titled “A method for broadband full-duplex MIMO radio” recently published online in the journal IEEE Signal Processing Letters. It was co-authored byYingbo Hua and Ping Liang, who are both electrical engineering professors, and three of their graduate students: Yiming Ma, Ali Cagatay Cirik and Qian Gao. Current radios for wireless communications are half-duplex, meaning signals are transmitted and received in two separate channels. Full duplex radios, which transmit signals at the same time in the same frequency band, can double the efficiency of the spectrum. 7 PAGE 8 Radio Law: Enforcement Feds in Cleveland, Ohio, have charged 28 year old Thomas M. Carbone and 23 year old Katie M. Stanton with the malicious destruction of federally-licensed communications lines. U.S. Attorney Steve Dettelbach said that the defendants are accused of allegedly breaking into and seriously damaging radio towers. The indictment charges that on or about August 17 to 18, 2012, Carbone and Stanton unlawfully entered the property of Radio One in North Royalton, Ohio, and willfully and maliciously destroyed and removed copper material from four radio station towers on the property. According to the indictment, this unlawful removal of copper depleted the signal strength of the radio station, thereby impeding its ability to broadcast emergency messages. As such emergency repairs cost nearly $11,000 while permanent repairs will cost an estimated $125,000. The indictment also charges that Carbone and Stanton conspired together to commit these unlawful acts. (CGC, Published News Reports) Chinese & Russian Interference Wolf, DK2OM, Coordinator IARU Monitoring System (IARUMS) Region 1 reports on strange Chinese signals in the amateur radio b a n d s . Since Oct. 25 we are suffering from mysterious Chinese signals on 7000, 14000, 21000 and 21010 kHz. At first the A3E signals were sounding like grunt or moo. Now we are receiving very strong multitone signals with a carrier and both sidebands every morning. The signals are also audible on 15000 (disturbing the time signal from RWM Moscow), 18000, 19000 and 20000 kHz. The purpose is unknown, perhaps a special kind of encrypted broadcast or a new generation of OTH radar? Please inform your national PTTs for official complaints! I informed the German PTT this morning. Many thanks to HB9CET for excellent observations a n d s u p p o r t ! For further details visit our external homepage: http://www.iarums-r1.org/ and look under "Latest Intruder News". There you can find links to my recordings. Wolf also reports that a taxi company in the Russian Federation is transmitting FM on 21404.2 kHz daily and all day. He reports that you can often hear a female voice organizing the business. Please use this frequency for amateur traffic on a daily basis. Please log your reports of Amateur Band intruders online at: http://peditio.net/intruder/ bluechat.cgi Monitor the short wave bands on-line with a web based SDR receiver at: h t t p : / / w w w . we b s d r . o r g / IARU Monitoring (IARUMS) System http://www.iarums-r1.org/ VOLUME 12 ISSUE 12 PAGE 1st Sandy Lesson - Improve Communication! As the recovery in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy continues, questions are being raised about our nation’s preparedness for emergencies. On Friday, November 9, 2012, it was reported that two Congressmen, U.S. Representatives Peter King and Steve Israel, were requesting that the military assume control of Long Island Power Authority (LIPA) in an effort to restore electricity to more than 150,000 homes and businesses. In the aftermath of a hurricane, or other disaster, communications are a challenge but municipal executives are charged with contingency planning. Cell phone communications were often scant but information eventually flowed through and residents became aware about school closings and other community events because there was an alert system. To my knowledge, LIPA had no such system in place, which should be a requirement of all utility companies. A simple text message supported by any cellular telephone is an effective means of communication. People sought to get information from traditional radios but reports on the radio were devoid of specifics about local communities. The problems being cited could have been mitigated with a more effective use of technology. Newsday reported that in 2006 LIPA was warned that its critical infrastructure could not handle a major storm. One of the issues noted was that LIPA was utilizing a 25-year old mainframe computer system that could not track power outages amongst other critical functions like monitoring rotting utility poles. Newsday noted that at LIPA’s headquarters engineers were working with paper maps and highlighters rather than strategizing with a computer system. Residents of Long Island, who pay one of the highest utility rates in the country, were understandably outraged, not so much because of the lack power but more so about the absence of communication from LIPA. With no access to Internet at home, many were reliant upon smartphones for Web access. The company’s mobile user Web site was inoperable for many days, which seriously hampered the ability to track LIPA’s progress in restoring power. The accuracy of that information was largely suspect to begin with; one LIPA report of outages in a town dramatically overstated the number of residents. It was only after a CBS reporter asked LIPA about a proposed plan to re-energize homes on the South shore following an inspection that many found out what was happening. There was no information about this plan on LIPA’s Web site. There should be county and state legislation that details reporting and communication requirements for utilities during a disaster. Federal legislation may also be appropriate given the immense size of federal funding being plowed into disaster areas. As we learned from the events of 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina, effective communication is essential during a disaster and these events changed the way we plan for disaster response and recovery. Technology plays a vital role. In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina it was problematic to locate missing people because of deficiencies in communications; transportation into affected areas was often non-existent; computer systems that had been part of the recovery plan were rendered useless with no electricity or gasoline. It appears that some of the lessons learned from Katrina had no impact on disaster recovery planning in the Northeast. The lack of gasoline still remains an issue and those stations with fuel had no generators to pump gasoline out. Communications by the authorities were often unhelpful with tensions brewing by millions of affected residents. New Yorkers are resilient and resourceful however and found other ways to track down gasoline using social media, like Twitter, or by going to the GasBuddy.com Website. Will our representatives legislate to facilitate a contingency plan for the transportation of gasoline or adopt new fuel storage policies? Interestingly, older technology played a vital role after this disaster. The Verizon network suffered widespread outages and with no electricity, telecommunications were problematic. The old corded telephones were plugged in and there were lines for payphones. Others resorted to using amateur radio to communicate, which was very effective. HAM radio has networks dedicated to handling communications traffic during outages. We know that disasters will occur and Hurricane Sandy was unprecedented. Power outages were inevitable but poor planning and ineffective communication is inexcusable. 9 PAGE 10 Backscatter From Wind Generators Wind farms have gained notoriety for their threat to national security and slaughter of migrating birds, but radio amateur G4BAO has shown they can have one benefit. The slaughter of migrating birds caused by wind farms was highlighted by former Enfield, Southgate MP Michael Portilo in a Sunday Times article September 18, 2005. The national security threat they pose by blinding national defence radar systems to incoming aircraft has been well documented. However, it appears wind farms may have one use, in this video John Worsnop G4BAO shows that the GB3CAM 10 GHz beacon can be received via backscatter from his local wind farm turbine blades. Watch Wind farm scatter at: http://youtu.be/ joKxKg0g0IE Portillo Wind Power http:// www.michaelportillo.co.uk/ articles/art_nipress/ windpower.htm Wind turbines can 'blind' Homeland Defense radar systems http:// www.southgatearc.org/ news/october2009/ stealth_wind_turbines.htm Ever See A Rotating Dipole? NEW for 2013, the DESDipole. A multi-band rotating dipole with no traps, no coils, no matching devices in fact, No Power-Sapping 'heater' devices at all! This means maximum radiating efficiency. In other words, most of your power is transmitted rather then being lost somewhere. DIRECT FEED, 50Ohm !! There is a single feed point on this antenna, the other bands (the one in the picture covers 15m, 10m and 6m) are parasitic elements. A Standard dipole is normally around 70Ohm and gives 1.4:1(ish) SWR. All three elements on the DES-Dipole (so called due to the OP-DES yagi style elements on the upper bands) compliment each other and ensure a low, flat SWR on each band. NO POWER LIMIT! Yes, you can pretty much put into it what you like. So why do antennas have power limits? When matching devices, coils or traps are installed, inefficiencies can creep in. This causes heat. the more power, the hotter they get until.. well, you know the rest! 5KW? No problem! SUPER STACKING Stacking 2 or more of these gives excellent performance with GAIN. COMPACT DESIGN Due to the deployment of the bent downward elements, the area this antenna covers is no larger than that of a 10m rotating dipole. W H Y W A I T ? Register your interest now, mono, dual and triband versions are available as of January. Email sales 'at' innovantennas.com for more information!! http://www.innovantennas.com/ latest-news.html VOLUME 12 ISSUE 12 PAGE FCC Proposes Implementing 2007 WRC Accords FYI—WRC stands for the World Radiocommunication Conference. Yes the headline reads 2007. They are just a little bit slow. The FCC has issued ET Docket 12-338 that if passed as written is pretty good news for ham radio. Bill Pasternak, WA6ITF, has the details: ET Docket 12-338 released on Tuesday, November 20th proposes to modify the rules governing a number of communications services for amateur radio which falls under Part 97 of its rules, the proposed changes are quite positive. Starting at the low end of the electromagnetic spectrum and working our way up, Docket 12-338 proposes the creation of a permanent albeit shared allocation from 135.7-137.8 kHz with a power output of 1 watt effective radiated power to an isotropic radiator. To those who have never heard the term isotropic radiator, this is a theoretical point source of electromagnetic waves that emits the same intensity of radiation in all directions. Translated into everyday language it really means hams will only be able to transmit a few hundred milliwatts of power if that. Now going down a bit to the 160 meter band. That where Docket 12-338 proposes to change the Amateur Radio Service allocation to make 1800 through 2000 kHz a primary amateur service allocation. By way of background, historically, the 1715 to 2000 kHz band was allocated exclusively to the Amateur Service. In 1953, the FCC removed the 1715 to 1800 kHz segment from the Amateur Radio Service and allocated the 1800 to 2000 kHz band to the Amateur Service on a shared basis with the Radionavigation Service. Then in 1983, the FCC allocated the 1800 to 1900 kHz band to the Amateur Service on an exclusive basis and the 1900 to 2000 kHz band to the Radiolocation Service on a primary basis and to the Amateur Service on a secondary basis. Lastly, in the WRC-07 Table Clean-Up Order, the FCC combined the 10 to 10.45 GHz and 10.45 to 10.5 GHz bands in the Federal Table of Allocations. In doing so, the frequency band was inadvertently not changed to 10 to 10.5 GHz. To fix this the FCC will revise the text of three footnotes that pertain to this spectrum by adding the existing Amateur Satellite Service allocation to the list of permitted non-federal services. It will also order that non-federal stations in the Radiolocation Service not cause harmful interference to the Amateur Service in the 10 to 10.5 GHz band. This is all pretty good news for ham radio here in the USA. If approved as written, these changes will implement allocation decisions from the 2007 World Radiocommunication Conference that concern those portions of the radiov frequency spectrum between 108 MHz and 20.2 GHz by making specific updates to the rules in this frequency range. You can download the full text of ET Docket 12-338 at as a Word document at tinyurl.com/proposed-wrc-changes 11 PAGE 12 NTSB Talking Distracted Driving The National Transportation Safety Board wants to eliminate all driver distraction and is broadening its focus on the use of portable electronic devices in all types of vehicles. The issue is part of the NTSB's recently released "2013 Most Wanted List." Norm Seeley, KI7UP, is here with the details: While acknowledging that distracted driving didn't begin when people began making calls or texting in the car, the National Transportation Safety Board still says that portable electronic devices that do not directly support the task at hand have no place in any vehicles. This includes automobiles planes, trains, and just about any other vessel you might be able to think of. As such it argues that states and regulators can set the proper tone by banning the nonessential use of such devices in all areas of transportation. The NTSB says that young drivers are more likely to use portable electronic devices while behind the wheel and therefore are especially at risk. It urges that laws, education, and enforcement efforts should place special emphasis on curbing the use of portable electronic devices by these younger drivers. The NTSB goes on to say that companies should develop and vigorously enforce policies to eliminate distractions. It also says that manufacturers can assist by developing technology that disables these devices when in reach of operators. But the NTSB has some strong opposition from the Consumer Electronics Association or CEA. That organization says that while it applauds the effort, it also notes that the NTSB misses the mark on the use of portable electronics in vehicles. It says that calling for an abstinence only approach, the NTSB ignores established realities of human behavior. It also claims that invehicle technology when used correctly can make for vastly safer roadways. The CEA says that rather than calling for broad regulations or outright bans, policymakers should encourage the use of the many innovative driver safety technologies coming on to the marketplace. The CEA notes that it has already forwarded the NTSB a list of third-party applications that promote safe use of portable technologies in the automobile. How any of this might affect mobile or even hand held pedestrian portable operations in the future by ham radio operators and other users of two-way radio is at this time unknown. But the NTSB stand seems to be that any and all forms of distraction must be removed from the public's hands while in transit. And that's not likely to sit well with the public at large. It should be noted that the National Transportation Safety Board is an independent body that has no authority to enact transportation policy, nor to force the federal government to make transportation policy changes. However it makes recommendations to governments, industry and the public and uses its "Most Wanted" list as a way to highlight changes that it is advocating. Be vigilant! Big Brother (Big Sister) wants your radio out of your vehicle. VOLUME 12 ISSUE 12 PAGE Free!!! Tower Work Webinar The World Wide Radio Operators Foundation will be presenting a webinar on towers and how to work safely on and around one on. Titled "Tower Work --Tips, Techniques, and Tools," this presentation taught by John Crovelli, W2GD, and Don Daso, K4ZA. During the session the two will outline things that they have learned from almost 100 years of combined experience, focusing on safety, cost savings, and of course problem solving. The hour long webinar will begin at 9 PM Eastern Standard Time on Wednesday, December 12th which equates to Thursday, December 13th at 02:00 UTC. Registration is free to hams world-wide at tinyurl.com/tower-webinarregistration. (K4ZW, QRZ.com) Please email [email protected] and let us know if you attend this webinar and/or have interest in climbing towers for the club from time to time. Drug Cartels Kidnapping Radio Workers If you are an Information Technology or two-way radio technician and planning a trip to Mexico, you might not carry an HT on a belt clip where it can be seen. This is because at least one Mexican drug gang seems to be kidnapping and enslaving those who know two-way radio to build and keep their private system going. Cheryl Lasek, K9BIK, takes a look at the situation south of the border: According to a report from Mexican news site Animal Politico, at least three dozen engineers and technicians have been kidnapped in the past four years. And Felipe Gonzalez who is the head of Mexico's Senate Security Committee told Animal Politico that none of the engineers who disappeared have ever been found. Mexican authorities blame the notorious drug running gang the Zeta's for the kidnappings. The Mexican military is trying to dismantle an extensive radio network built and operated by the drug cartel but to date authorities have not had much luck shutting it down. Not only is much of the equipment super-easy to replace, but the drug runners have apparently found some unwilling assistance by kidnapping and enslaving technicians to help build it. Among them is at least one IBM employee and several communications technicians from a firm owned by Mexico's largest construction company. Last year the Mexican military found and dismantled one such drug runners radio network spread across northeastern Mexico that included 167 radio antennas sites. As recently as this past September, Mexican marines found a 295-foothigh transmission tower in Veracruz State. The bottom line: It seems the drug gangs have discovered that two-way radio is a tool that they will not be without but the Mexican government is doing all it can to take these clandestine operations off the air. One of the best stories in the English language that explains in depth the safety issue to engineers and technicians in Mexico is on the World Disaster Report website. Its on-line at tinyurl.com/enslaved-technicians.(Animal Politico, Whatspoppin.net, World Disaster Report, other news sources) One more reason NOT to travel to Mexico. 13 PAGE 14 Work Proceeds To Recover A0-27 Amsat Oscar 27 is down but not out. This according to controllers who are working to return of the satellites FM repeater back to service after it stopped responding on October 5th. Here is the back story. In early October AO-27 was restored to running on its primary boot loader program. Control operators were able to turn on the transmitter for a short time on several occasions. Also required were multiple recoveries the stuck AFSK modem. During recovery efforts AO-27 crashed once again on October 16. The command team again recovered the satellite to the boot loader state. It was also recovered from another occurrence of the AFSK modem problem and they again performed another software upload. On October 18 the transmitter was left on in an attempt to discharge the batteries with the hope that faults could be cleared. Once the battery was recharged the high-level software aboard AO-27 ran for a few seconds before locking up. The team was able to reset it back to the bootloader once again. Telemetry indicate AO-27 is locking up while fetching telemetry from the hardware. As such, controllers say that it does not look like there will be a quick resolution to this crash. In the meantime the AO-27 controllers are asking the ham radio public not to attempt to use the AO-27 if you hear it in analog mode. This to prevent interfering with the command team's recovery efforts. (AMSAT) JAPAN SCHEDULES FIRST LAUNCH OF NEW EPSILON ROCKET Japan is scheduled to launch its first Epsilon solid-fueled rocket next August or September. The flight will deploy a planetary telescope while on-orbit while demonstrating new low-cost rocket assembly and control techniques, the Japanese space agency announced last week. The Epsilon program is designed to cut in half the cost of Japanese small satellite launches. Japan's M5 rocket, which launched seven times before retiring in 2006, cost $94 million per flight. Engineers designed the Epsilon rocket with a simplified control system, and the vehicle's own computers will autonomously monitor the status of its systems during countdown. Only a handful of engineers with laptop computers are required on the launch control team. The Epsilon is also designed to launch after only seven days of assembly on the launch pad, reducing labor and overhead costs. (ANS) VOLUME 12 ISSUE 12 PAGE Heart Monitoring Study Continues The FCC has granted a request by Boston Scientific Corporation to extend the existing waiver of Section 15.205 of its rules to continue tests of the company's Cognis cardiac device. The FCC says that granting Boston Scientifics' request will permit this device to continue to use the 90 to 110 kHz frequency band while Boston Scientific completes its ongoing MultiSENSE clinical trial, begun in 2010, in which it is using the Cognis device to collect physiologic data related to patients' worsening heart failure. The present waiver is scheduled to expire on November 17, 2012, and the extension will permit the continued manufacture and marketing of the subject devices until December 31, 2013, when the referenced clinical trial is expected to complete its enrollment. (FCC) Science Fiction Becomes Reality From our technology page, it appears as if science fiction has become a military fact. This after a successful missile test has ushered in a new era of warfare in which the military can take out electronic targets without destroying a single building or harming human beings. Bill Pasternak, WA6ITF, is here with the story: According to news reports, back on October 16th an experimental missile called CHAMP fired bursts of high power microwave energy at an unoccupied site to damage computers and other electronic systems during a test at the Utah Test and Training Range. The Counter Electronics High Power Microwave Advanced Missile Project flew over the Utah test site and brought down the compound's entire spectrum of electronic systems, apparently without producing any other damage at all. Even cameras recording the test was shut down. Keith Coleman is the CHAMP program manager for Boeing Phantom Works. He says that in the near future this technology may be used to render an enemy's electronic and data systems useless even before the first troops or aircraft arrive. The idea of using microwaves or electromagnetic pulses to knock out electronic systems without having to reduce cities or military bases to rubble first arose during Cold War nuclear tests. There scientists found that explosions created electromagnetic pulses that damaged some civilian power grids and other facilities. It will be interesting to see where the development of this new electronic warfare device goes in years to come. (Science OnLine, Business Insider, Discovery News, others) Google EMP for more information on this topic and to see how it could impact amateur radio. 15 PAGE 16 English Ham Rescues U.S. Bound Planes A Castlederg, England amateur radio enthusiast has become the unlikely hero of a double aeroplane rescue, all from the comfort of his own home. Benny Young (29) was turning the dial on his FT 2000 ham radio on the night of Monday October 29, the same time that Hurricane Sandy began its lashing of the American eastern seaboard, when he heard, “…mayday mayday mayday…” Immediately Benny started broadcasting on that frequency. Details are still emerging this week but it turns out, a transatlantic flight from Dublin bound for Boston was 180 miles from destination when disaster struck. Because of the storm, Boston’s Logan International Airport was having trouble with electricity supply and the Instrument Landing System – which guides pilots to land their planes – wasn’t functioning properly. Subsequently, Air Traffic Control couldn’t hear the mayday call and the pilot couldn’t hear any broadcast from ground control. Enter the Castlederg man. “I responded to the plane, gave my call sign, MI3 JQD and asked them what was wrong,” Benny explained. “It was the night that the hurricane was giving Boston the holly, as they say, and the flight couldn’t hear anything on the ground. “They must have thought they were going to be able to land before the weather turned. Then the storm arrived and they didn’t think they were going to reach Boston at all.” CRISIS According to Benny, during a crisis situation when phone networks are down and electricity supplies are unreliable, an emergency network of US amateur radio operators swings into action. Knowing this, the Derg man tuned into the American emergency frequency and was able to contact ‘Bob’, an amateur radio operator who in turn contacted Logan International. By relaying messages from the flight to Bob and then to Air Traffic Control – and vice versa – Benny was able to guide the plane to safety, re-routing to a miraculous landing at an airport in Buffalo. Benny continued, “There were times the airport could hear the plane and there were times they couldn’t. I tried to help as much as I could, relaying messages from the plane to the ground and then from the ground to the plane. I kept writing it all down as well, heading, altitude, speed, wind speed – and then I passed this on. “I logged everything in my logbook as I went along. It worked out all right in the end,” he added humbly. SECOND PLANE Amazingly, lightning struck twice on the same night and when it emerged that a second flight was in trouble, an American Airlines from Heathrow to Boston, Benny stepped up to the plate once again. “I did the same thing and this time the plane was re-routed to JFK,” the local member of Strabane Amateur Radio Society remarked. “It was one of those freak incidents. “Nothing like this has ever happened to me before. “It was some rush too but I tried to keep calm and I kept writing the altitude and heading and all the rest down. “I had just been turning the dial on the radio and this was what I landed in.” Article continues on the next page. VOLUME 12 ISSUE 12 PAGE Looking For A Net? Sunday - The Coastal "YL" Net rolls at 8:00 pm weekly. This net is for young ladies of all ages. This is a lady's social net on the W7BU repeater system. For this net, the W7BU repeater system will be linked to the BeachNet System. Tuesday - No nets. Wednesday - STARS ARES Seaside Tsunami Net 7pm weekly on repeater - 145.490 with a PL Tone of 118.8. Thursday—Oregon ARES District One. This net rolls on the Timber repeater (in the Forest Grove area) on 145.270 with a PL Monday - The Clatsop County tone of 107.2 at 7:30 PM. ARES Net rolls at 7pm weekly on FYI - District One includes Clatthe W7BU repeater system. The sop, Clackamas, Columbia, MultW7BU repeater system is nor- nomah, Tillamook and Washingmally linked to the BeachNet ton counties. System for this net. The OEN (Oregon Emergency Net). rolls daily on 3980 kHz at 6:00 PM and 7:00 PM. NTS Nets Daily 5:30 PM 3990 kHz Daily 5:45 PM Oregon ARES Traffic Net on 3920 kHz Daily 6:30 PM Oregon Section Net/1 on 3569 kHz. Daily 10:00 PM 3569 kHz Oregon Section Net/2 Daily 6:05 PM on 145.27, 145.47, 146.62, 4440.825 & 443.15 all use a English Ham, Cont’d A fork-lift driver for LW Surphlis & Son, Benny admits he potentially saved lives that day – and he said he’d do it again. “I didn’t mind doing it and if I heard it again I’d be back in, flat to the tin. It was some buzz.” Commending Benny on his quick thinking and calm head, Terry Whyte from Strabane Amateur Radio Society – of which Benny is a member – said the Castlederg man should be proud of himself. “Certain stations are set aside on these bands and Benny was at the right frequency at the right time,” the club secretary remarked. “He recorded everything in his log but we still gave him a good grilling at the last club meeting – in fact everyone else is jealous. This kind of thing is an amateur radio man’s dream.” 17 PAGE 18 New Stuff At Space Weather As we know, weather in space affects our communications here on Earth. So it behooves us all to payy attention to what is going on out there. SpaceWeather has announced new products/ services for us. This note from National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Tentatively on December 11th the Space Weather Prediction Center will introduce two new forecast products titled the 3-Day Forecast and the Forecast Discussion. These new products will be available twice a day at 00:30 and 12:30 UTC to provide space weather information in abbreviated and detailed formats. analysis. These two products will supplement the existing product suite and no current forecasts will be discontinued. (OPDX, W8KVK) Both will use NOAA Space Weather Scale information. Examples of these new products are available at: tinyurl.com/caqy4ox and for the concise, 1-page summary and at: tinyurl.com/bm9flp6 for the in-depth space weather ReconRobotics Using 70cm The FCC have refused an ARRL petition to stop the use of the amateur radio 70cm band by surveillance r o b o t s . The ARRL say: On November 14, the FCC issued an Order on Reconsideration dismissing a March 2010 Petition for Reconsideration filed by the ARRL that asked the Com- mission to deny pending Public Safety Pool license applications associated with the ReconRobotics Video and Audio Surveillance System; however, in doing so, the FCC made it clear that the devices may not exceed 100 kHz of bandwidth. The Recon Scout - manu- factured by ReconRobotics - is a remote-controlled, maneuverable surveillance robot that transmits realtime video surveillance data that operates by FCC waiver in the 70 centimeter band. I hope you never run into one of these babies. Marlon Brando’s Ham Shack Now I have found it again His private island will be a and it's a pleasure to share luxury resort in 2013. This is those pictures with you all. a perfect moment to remember how it looked in the 80s. As you may already know, Marlon Brando was You can see the pics here: FO5GJ while in Tahiti and http://www.ea1uro.com/ Among the pictures, I spot- he was on the air under the web2/foro/index.php? ted 2 ham radio related name of Martin Brandeaux. topic=2003.0 by Fernando, EC1AME ones... So I kept the article. Back in the 80s, I was reading the Spanish magazine HOLA and found a very interesting article about Marlon Brando's island in the Pacific. VOLUME 12 ISSUE 12 PAGE DARPA Needs Space Gazers The U.S. military is launching a far-out neighborhood watch. But instead of warding off burglars, it's recruiting amateur astronomers to assist in tracking orbital debris and there-by help in avoiding possible satellite collisions in Earth orbit. The sky-monitoring project, called SpaceView, is a Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency or DARPA program that enrolls the talents of amateur astronomers to help protect American space assets from orbital trash. These dangerous objects include spent rocket stages, defunct satellites and fragments from other spacecraft that are the result of erosion, explosion and collision. DARPA says that a collision between one of these small pieces of debris and a satellite could release more than 20,000 times the energy of The concept of the SpaceView program is to provide more diverse data to the Space Surveillance Network. This is a U.S. Air Force program charged with cataloguing and observing space junk and debris to identify potential near-term collisions. NASA estimates more than 500,000 pieces of hazardous space debris orbit the Earth, threatening satellites that among other things support peacekeeping and combat missions. For more information on DARPA's SpaceView project take your web browser to www.spaceviewnetwork.com. (Space.com) New Chinese Data Mode CP-16 Existing amateur radio data modes have been based around the English alphabet. Now a new mode has been developed to handle Chinese characters. Since 2011 the Chinese Radio Amateurs Club (CRAC) have been working on a project to develop a new mode CP-16, which stands for Chinese character Pattern of 16 x 16 dot-matrixes. To achieve the goal of allow easy communication at very low S/N ratio, CP-16 is designed to directly transmit the graphic image of Chinese character as a 16 by 16 dot-matrix, one line at a time and about 10 ms per line adjustable according to the conditions. This makes the total transmission speed of 2 to 5 characters per second, which is suitable for real-time reading. It uses 16 on-off keyed audio carriers (hense the name CP=16) spaced at 17 Hz intervals, the total bandwidth is under 400 Hz. The CP-16 message can be received by any SDR receiver or the combination of an ordinary SSB receiver and a PC computer, plus any SDR/audio analyzing software with waterfall display. The text will be directly shown on the waterfall graph. The human brain will easily filter out all sorts of noise and correctly pick up the character. A paper on the work was presented by CRAC to the IARU Region 3 conference in Vietnam and can be seen at: http://www.iaru-r3.org/15r3c/docs/056.doc The BBC have recently published an article regarding the pronunciation of Mandarin Chinese names at: h t t p : / / w w w . b b c . c o . u k / b l o g s / m a g a z i n e m o n i t o r / 2 0 1 2 / 1 1 / how_to_say_chinese_leaders.shtml BBC Text Spelling Guide http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/magazinemonitor/text_spelling_guide.doc 19 W7BU Sunset Empire Amateur Radio Club, Inc. P.O. Box 264 Astoria, OR. 97103-0264 503-895-3207 www.sunset-empire-arc.org Email: [email protected] President - Jim Santee (KF7NE) V.P. - Greg Filliger (N7RIA) [email protected] [email protected] Secretary - Don Webb (WB7SKX) Treasurer - Pat Haggard (AE7QU) Trustee - Terry Wilson (KB7SI) [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] December Meeting SEARC will not hold a membership meeting in the month of December. Patricia Love, President of the Seaside Tsunami Amateur Radio Society (STARS), has extended an invitation to all SEARC members to attend the STARS December Christmas gathering at Bigfoot’s Restaurant in Seaside at 1:00 PM on December the 8th. The Board of SEARC would like to extend a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all who read this newsletter. We hope and pray uou have a safe holiday. Eat More Ham May a HAM angel visit you soon.