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This Week's News

IRTS Radio News Bulletin Sunday March 7th 2021
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Peter Grant EI4HX Silent Key

We regret to announce the sudden death of Peter Grant EI4HX at his home
in Dundalk, County Louth on Tuesday last, March 2nd. Peter, a native of
County Down, was an ex- member and ex-officer of the Dundalk Amateur
Radio Society and at national level was a committee member of the Irish
Radio Transmitters Society for many years and served at various times
as book sales manager and awards manager between 1997 and 2011. Peter
was also active on VHF and UHF and on HF he was prominent in the Worked
All Ireland Award Scheme. Peter was laid to rest on Saturday March 6th
at Kilsaran cemetery. We extend our deepest sympathy to his wife Eileen
and sons Joey and John and his extended family and friends.
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HAREC Training Courses

Applications are still being accepted for the next HAREC on-line course
starting on March 30th. The course will run on Tuesdays and Wednesdays
for 8 weeks. The course is free for IRTS members and intending members
and the closing date for applications is March 20th. Send expressions
of interest to harectraining /at/ gmail.com.
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IRTS Annual General Meeting

Due to the continuing and forecasted Covid-9 pandemic restrictions, the
2021 IRTS Annual General Meeting will be held online on the Zoom
platform on Saturday April 24th at 1100. The annual committee report,
financial report, committee nominations and formal notice of the AGM
will be included in the upcoming spring edition of Echo Ireland. Also
included will be details on how to arrange your attendance at the
meeting on Zoom.
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South Eastern Amateur Radio Group News Bulletins

The Tuesday evening broadcast of the IRTS radio news by Sean Byrne
EI2HZB on behalf of the South Eastern Amateur Radio Society is getting
great support from the amateur radio community all over the country and
beyond. This bulletin is broadcast on the Southern Ireland Repeater
Network of voice repeaters on both the 2 metres and 70 centimetres
bands and facilitates callers from as far away as Mayo and Cavan. The
Zello app as well as Echolink are also used by callers from both
Ireland and abroad. The number of callers has been increasing gradually
over recent months and reached a record number of 68 on last weeks
broadcast. Congratulations to newsreader Sean, his logging assistant
Keith and all who call in to support the service and of course the
repeaters providers of the Southern Ireland repeater network.
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IARU Monitoring System

One of the roles of the International Amateur Radio Union is the
monitoring of our bands for unauthorised users. The IARU Monitoring
System in Region One was set up in 1972 and has a coordinator in many
countries and we are very grateful to Michael EI3GYB who carries out
this role for us in Ireland. Michael monitors the bands and sends a
monthly report to the Region One coordinator who processes all the
information submitted. These reports can be viewed on www.iaru-r1.org
The primary objective of the IARU Monitoring System is the search,
classification, identification and initiation of steps leading to the
removal from amateur bands of radio signals of non-amateur stations
causing harmful interference to the amateur services, contrary to
International Telecommunications Union and national radio regulations.
Typical intruders include Broadcasters, Over the Horizon Radars,
illegal operators on the bands including taxicabs and fishermen on
various bands, various military modes and many more types of unwanted
signals. In his report for February, as well as the usual suspects,
Michael details the following about a church radio. A church in the
West of Ireland produced a lot of harmonics from 28390 to 28470 kHz and
on several other frequencies due to a fault in the transmitter set up.
The interference lasted from the 1st to the 8th of the month. The
parish priest was made aware of the situation and advised to rectify
the problems. The "Parish Radio" was silent for a couple of days and
returned later without causing any more interference, broadcasting only
on its own frequency. The problems seems to have been solved.
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Help for CW Beginners

Newcomers to CW often have difficulty finding stations to work at slow
speeds. To address that problem there is a small group of dedicated
radio amateurs who regularly help beginners to take that 'Giant Leap'
and use CW on air for the first time. They have a Facebook page `SLOW
CW UK' and invite members from all parts of the world to join them. For
those interested in taking their first steps, into what might be
referred to as the 'Dark Art' of CW communication, have a listen out
around 3.555MHz plus or minus QRM most evenings from around 1930 to
2030z. The group have specific activity nights on Wednesday and
Saturday evenings but one or two of them can be found around those
frequencies most evenings often calling "CW SLOW". These amateurs take
some of the fear out of using Morse code on air for the first few
times. So, if you feel you can copy CW at around 10 word per minute or
more then answer their CQ calls or arrange a sked. Most of them are
retired so daytime skeds can be arranged as well as evening ones.
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International Space Station Schools QSO

Technical issues with the ISS radio prevented students at Wyoming's
Newcastle High School hooking with the ISS in January but they finally
made the promised QSO with ISS Commander Mike Hopkins KF5LJG thanks to
the use of the Russian 2 metre station on board. During a January 27
spacewalk to install exterior cabling on the ISS Columbus module, the
current coax feed line installed 11 years ago was replaced with another
built by the European Space Agency (ESA) and Airbus. On reconnecting
the radio equipment, the problem was discovered. ARISS chair Frank
Bauer, KA3HDO, announced that efforts were under way to identify the
issue that caused the radio to fail in January and a team is working
with NASA and the European Space Agency on a solution.
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On the Air next week

The Indonesian Yankee Bravo DX RTTY Contest takes place on Saturday
next from midnight Friday for 24 hours. The exchange is report and
serial number and the multipliers are YB prefixes and DXCC entities.
The South America 10 metre contest runs for 24 hours from 1200 on
Saturday next the 13th. on both CW and SSB. The exchange is report and
CQ Zone and multipliers are CQ zones and South American prefixes. The
Stew Perry Top Band Challenge starts at 1500 on Saturday next March
13th and finishes at 1500 on Sunday. The exchange is your four
character grid square and a point is awarded for every 500 kilometres.
The Echo Alpha PSK63 contest organised by the Spanish National Society
URE runs for 24 hours from 1600 on Saturday March the 13th. The
exchange for stations outside Spain is report and serial number.

Now some DX news: Hiro, JF1OCQ, is now active as 5W7X (remotely from
Japan) from Samoa (OC-097). The length of his activity is not known.
Activity will be on all HF bands. QSL via JF1OCQ. See QSL info on
QRZ.com. Bodo, HB9EWU is QRV as 9J2BG while working on a humanitarian
mission in the Luapula Province, Zambia. He is active in his spare time
generally on 20 meters. QSL to home call. Paul, KA4WPX is QRV as
V7/KA4WPX and V73AX from Kwajalein Atoll, the Marshall Islands IOTA
Oceania-028. Activity is at various times on 160 to 10 meters, and
possibly 6 meters, using CW and SSB. QSL direct. Randy, WW6RG/KH9
announces he is returning to Wake Island, Oceania-053 and plans
activity on the following days: March 21, March 26 and April 1, with
limited activity. Check 20 or 17m SSB around 04:30z to 07:00z those
days. He will use an IC-705 and an AlexLoop. QSL via home call.
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Cork Radio Club Weekly Zoom meetings

Members of Cork Radio Club and guests meet weekly at 2030 on the Zoom
platform after the 2 metre IRTS news broadcast by Vincent EI7HN on the
Cork repeater. The link to the meeting is on the Club's Facebook page
and visitors are always very welcome to join in.
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That is the news for this week. Items for inclusion in next week's
radio news can be submitted by email to newsteam/at/irts/dot/ie for
automatic forwarding to both the radio and printed news services. The
deadline is midnight on Thursday. Urgent late items for the news may be
telephoned to News Editor Dave EI4BZ on 087-6290574

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