On Feb 27, 9:23 pm, "Dee Flint" wrote:

Actually if a person died the day they received their license, it could be

12 years before it showed up not two if no one bothers to report it.

As N3LI wrote, that would be sad!

However, when it showed up in the totals is a matter of which totals
you use.

If you use numbers that include the entire FCC database, such as
hamdata.com, you get both unexpired, current licenses and expired-but-
in-the-grace-period licenses, and it takes 12 years before an
unreported death shows up.

But if you use numbers that include only the unexpired, current
licenses, such as ARRL and AH0A, it takes 10 years before an
unreported death shows up.

Note that the terms "expire" and "expiration" refer to the end of the
10 year license term, and do not include the grace period. That's not
my definition, it's FCC's definition. Hamdata.com uses the term "no
longer hams" to indicate licenses which have reached the end of the
grace period without being renewed.

Of course in real life there are several factors which complicate the
issue and make simple conjectures inaccurate:

1) An unknown number of deaths *are* reported to FCC by family
members. Often this is done so the SK's callsign can be transferred to
another amateur in the family, or a club.

2) An unknown number of amateurs renew in the grace period.

3) Not all licenses which expire are the result of death. It is not
unknown for a licensed amateur to lose interest and let the license
not only expire but run past the end of the grace period. Years later,
the ex-ham's interest is revitalized and s/he gets a new license. This
was probably more common in the days of 5 year licenses but one still
encounters recent "retread" hams today.

73 de Jim, N2EY