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Old January 9th 12, 11:46 AM posted to rec.radio.amateur.moderated,rec.radio.amateur.misc,rec.radio.amateur.policy
Alan Alan is offline
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First recorded activity by RadioBanter: Jan 2007
Posts: 20
Default Amateur Radio Newsline(tm) Report 1795 - January 6 2012

In article William M. Pasternak writes:
Amateur Radio Newsline(tm) Report 1795 - January 6 2012


TIME TRAVEL: SAMOA AND TOKELAU JUMP INTERNATIONAL DATELINE

The tiny South Pacific nation of Samoa and its neighbor Tokelau have
jumped forward in time crossing westward over the International Date
Line. This, to align themselves with their other 21st century trading
partners throughout the region.

At the stroke of midnight on December 29th time in Samoa and Tokelau
leapt forward to December 31st which was New Year's Eve. For Samoa's
186,000 citizens, and the 1,500 in Tokelau, Friday December 30, 2011
simply ceased to exist.

Of coarse this does complicate the QSL'ing process for ham radio
contacts made with either of these entities on the dates that were
simply cast away. It will be interesting to see how the DXCC and
pother awards operations handle this situation. (Media Network)



Except, of course, that one either logged the contact in UTC, or can convert
the time of the contact at each end to UTC, to confirm the contact was logged
at the same time at each end.

While the *local* time may show a discontinuity/gap, UTC plugs on unchanged
through the event. There was no time that didn't exist. Thus, there is no
issue with contacts on dates cast away.

- - - -

Looked at a different way, December 30 didn't exist in those places. Thus,
nobody there could have made a contact on that day, so (again) no problem
could occur.


Alan
wa6azp