RSGB GB2RS News Bulletin for May 24th 2020.

GB2RS NEWS

Sunday the 24th of May 2020

The news headlines:

YOTA Online programme launched

SARL celebrates 95 years

Change to the exam booking system

As all planned YOTA 2020 events have been cancelled until September, a new programme called YOTA Online has been developed. This will be a monthly Livestream gathering, free to all participants and available afterwards as a recorded version. In each meeting, the YOTA team will present different topics and answer questions from the YOTA community. There will also be opportunities to share stories of recent YOTA events. The first meeting will be on the 28th of May. Details of the Livestream link will be publicised on the YOTA website and social media channels the day before

Last Wednesday, the 20th, the South African Radio Relay League celebrated its 95th anniversary. It was formed on Wednesday the 20th of May 1925, just a month after the world’s radio amateurs met in Paris to form the world body, the International Amateur Radio Union. In 1947 the word Relay was dropped from the name. Their message is that amateur radio has withstood the test of time because it is based on three major guiding principles: communication between people, continuous technology development and self-education and training.

In response to the demand for remote invigilated exams, the RSGB is launching a new, automated booking system. It will make each part of the process smoother for applicants and HQ staff. As all 600 exam slots in June have now been filled, the new booking system will go live on 1 June in readiness for booking July exam slots. Over the next ten days, the Society will share more details about the system and how to use it. In the meantime, please note that the RSGB is not accepting any new bookings via the old application form.

The RSGB’s national ‘Get on the air to care’ campaign in partnership with the NHS has received more media coverage this week, including a BBC radio interview with 11-year-old Anne-Marie who was nominated by her primary school headteacher as the local hero of the week for the two weekly nets she has been running during the lockdown. Telford and District Amateur Radio Society were featured in their local paper and other radio amateurs have been sharing their stories with us. Thank you to everyone who is showing their support by getting on the air, caring for other radio amateurs and trying new aspects of amateur radio. More details about the campaign, media coverage and stories from clubs and radio amateurs can be seen on the RSGB website at www.rsgb.org/gota2c.

Users of the Islands on the Air programme may now obtain contact credits via the ARRL’s Logbook of The World. A similar arrangement is already in place with Club Log. To claim a new island group from matched Logbook of The World contacts, users should click on Retrieve QSOs from LoTW to retrieve matching records. Within 30 minutes, IOTA users will receive an email listing the matches added to a list of pending contacts.

Joe Taylor, K1JT reports what is possibly the first FT8 contact via Moonbounce that took place on the 21st of May between Paul, W2HRO and Peter, PA2V. They used WSJT-X 2.2.0-rc1, a beta-release candidate for version 2.2 of the program WSJT-X. Both stations have moderate 4-Yagi setups on 432MHz. Conditions were not particularly good, with degradation around 3dB and the Sun only 20 degrees from the Moon.

The Royal Air Force Air Cadets are pleased to announce that the next Exercise Blue Ham will be held on the MoD 5MHz shared band over the weekend of the 6th and 7th of June. There are plenty of call signs available for Cadets over the period of the exercise using both SSB voice and data modes. Details can be found at https://alphacharlie.org.uk/exercise-blue-ham

Now the special event news

Since the change of regulations applying to special event stations in the UK, many activations are now able to go ahead. UK amateurs would like to thank Ofcom for their help in making this happen.

The RAF Amateur Radio Society will be activating the special event GB75VED until the 28th of May. Operations will be from members’ homes. Details are at www.rafars.org/GB75VED and on QRZ.com.

Dragon Amateur Radio Club and North Wales Radio Society are operating GB0GIG throughout May, named after the National Health Service in the Welsh language. The station will be active on HF, VHF and UHF using as many modes as possible. An award certificate is available and full details can be found on QRZ.com.

Durham and District Amateur Radio Society is participating as one of the bonus stations in the popular 13 Colonies special event. The special callsign GB13COL has been issued for this event and will run from 1300 UTC on the 1st of July to 0400 UTC on the 8th. The primary focus of the event will be the HF bands, including VHF & UHF for QSOs using SSB, CW, FM and various digital modes.

Now the contest news

Please remember to check before the events for new rules due to lockdown and social distancing, which may differ around the world. RSGB strongly advises obeying your own government’s advice first and foremost.

Today, the 24th, the third 70MHz Cumulative contest runs from 1400 to 1600UTC. Using all modes, the exchange is signal report, serial number and locator.

On Tuesday the SHF UK Activity Contest runs from 1800 to 2130UTC. Using all modes on the 2.3 to 10GHz bands, the exchange is signal report, serial number and locator.

On Thursday it’s the CW leg of the 80m Club Championships. Running from 1900 to 2030UTC, the exchange is signal report and serial number.

Next weekend is the CQ World Wide WPX CW contest. It runs for 48 hours from 0000UTC on the 30th to 2359UTC on the 31st. Using the 1.8 to 28MHz contest bands, the exchange is signal report and serial number.

Next Sunday, the 31st, the UK Microwave group High Band Contest runs from 0600 to 1800UTC. Using all modes on the 5.7 to 10GHz bands, the exchange is signal report, serial number and locator.

The UK Six Metre Group’s Summer Marathon runs until the 2nd of August. Using all modes on the 50MHz band, the exchange is your 4-character locator.

And finally, join the fun of the next round of RSGB Hope QSO Party on weekdays. See www.rsgbcc.org/hf.

Now the radio propagation report, compiled by G0KYA, G3YLA and G4BAO on Friday the 22nd of May.

Last week was dominated by extensive Sporadic-E openings that made 10 metres sound like 20 metres on a good day. The openings were steady and stable, with lots of stations around Europe being very workable. These openings extended to multi-hop as well, with Chris, VO1CH being heard on 10m FT8 at 1240UTC on Monday the 18th for example. Low-power beacons have also been heard – the IW4EIR beacon, running just 1.5W, was heard on 28.195MHz at 1600UTC on Monday as well.

If you are interested in monitoring 10m beacons, Martin, G3USF has updated his 10 metre beacon list. It is available on the RSGB website under the Propagation section, using the link on the right-hand side, Propagation Beacons.

Hopefully, the Sporadic-E season will continue to improve over the next few weeks. Other than Sporadic-E, HF conditions have been average for this time of year. Late Spring and Summer are traditionally times when maximum usable frequencies decline during the day due to a change in ionospheric chemistry. However, the good news is that night-time MUFs are higher, with bands like 20 metres remaining open long after sunset if there is sufficient ionisation.

The Sun remains very quiet. Two lighter plage areas – bright regions in the Sun’s chromosphere – have moved into view, but are unlikely to turn into sunspots. As a result, NOAA predicts the solar flux index will remain around 70. It also predicts that the Sun will remain stable geomagnetically, bringing a maximum Kp index of two. So it looks like Sporadic-E will continue to provide the HF fun on the higher HF bands.

And now the VHF and up propagation news.

Most of next week will be dominated by high pressure just south of the UK and hence Tropo will be a good mode to try. At this time of the year, the strong sunshine makes any nocturnal enhancement of conditions temporary and soon disappears after sunrise and the new thermals destroy the night-time cooling inversion.

However, the main high-pressure subsidence inversion is a different case and extends across the same region as the area of high pressure and will be present throughout. This will mean paths across the North Sea, English Channel or Bay of Biscay should do well. Unlike Sporadic-E, Tropo contacts need not be rushed.

A fairly strong Atlantic jet stream will push across the UK this weekend and when it reaches the near continent it will be in a good place for Sporadic-E in a broad direction range from Scandinavia round through the Balkans to Italy and Spain.

Meanwhile, the Atlantic will continue to provide jet stream segments for openings across the pond. The association of Sporadic-E with jet streams is useful since the charts show the meandering jet stream extending well east over Russia and could be used for paths to the Far East.

There is a hint that a region of showers may develop around the middle of next week to give an opportunity for some GHz rain scatter propagation.

The Moon’s reaches peak declination on Tuesday and path losses are falling all week. 144MHz sky noise is low.

A number of small showers keep May and June an active time for meteor scatter operations, so keep looking for early morning opportunities before the Sporadic-E.

And that’s all from the propagation team this week.