EUDXF supported DX
4U1ITU back on the air
You may have worked 4U1ITU recently or you may have seen some 4U1ITU cluster spots. The operation is real and the station will be on the air until 3 June. After a two year lock down, the ITU building in Geneva is back in business. Currently a series of meetings of Study Group 4 (satellites) and 5 (terrestrial and amateur) Working Parties takes place.
The two year lockdown has not been good for equipment and antennas. Lots of technical issues had/have to be solved. As it looks now (but we have to wait and see) 4U1ITU can operate on WARC bands with dipole fixed NW/SE and use the STEPP-IR on 40/20/15/10. A second radio is now being set up for 6 meters including FT8.
This activity will most likely be the last one before the reconstruction of the ITU building starting by the end of the year. The shack will be closed soon for several years. It is recommended to fill empty bandslots now.
NP4G visit to Europe
Otis NP4G one of the 3Y0J team members visited Netherlands and Belgium over Easter. Achim DF3EC and Hans PB2T had a short meeting with him in the Amsterdam Water Supply Dunes. This location was chosen to allow Otis to add another entity to his DXFC. The weather was excellent but conditions were not as result of recent solar disturbances.
Next stop for Otis will be Svalbard where he will do some serious cold weather training. The DX pedition to Bouvet, 2nd on the Most Wanted List is scheduled for January 2023. See https://www.3y0j.no
Kosovo (Z6) in the WPX Contest and Albania (ZA) on 6m
Martti, OH2BH/Z68BH and Pertti, OG2M/Z68MM will be traveling to Kosovo this week. They plan to close several open ends with the Kosovo Amateur Radio Society (SHRAK) and their Telecom administrators (ARKEP). This includes potential 6M permits for the future.
While in Kosovo, Martti, Z68BH will be giving out the Z68 multiplier to those in the CQ WPX (CW) Contest. From Kosovo, Martti and Pertti will move to Albania by road with Z61DX and possible others. From Albania, ZA/OG2M will be active, specifically on 6M.
Ultimately, they will fly to Munich (DL) and on to Friedrichshafen, where at DARC’s special invitation they will give a “Mission Goodwill Kosovo” presentation on Friday June.01 at 4P.M. The presentation will be in the lecture room Schweiz which has a capacity of 180 people. Be early to get good seating. Many of the Z60A project participants/operators will be on hand for this occasion.
Z60A QSL CARDS: It should be noted that all Z60A direct requests, OQRS and postal have been mailed. There is no backlog as of today. The last batch of some 700 cards were mailed on Friday of last week.