RAC Bulletin 111126

RAC Ontario Section Bulletin for November 26, 2011

NATIONAL NEWS

1. Canada Winter Contest

This year's RAC Canada Winter Contest will run from 0000 UTC to 2359
UTC, Saturday, December 17. Bands and Modes are 160, 80, 40, 20, 15,
10, 6 and 2 metres, CW and phone; Stations in Canada send RS(T) and
province or territory. VEØs and stations outside Canada send RS(T)
and a serial number. Contacts with stations in Canada or VEØs are
worth 10 points, stations outside Canada are worth 2 points, and RAC
official stations are worth 20 points. For more information see
tinyurl.com/rac-contests

-- RAC Web Page

ONTARIO SECTION NEWS

ITEMS OF INTEREST

2. Plasma Experiment Seeks Amateur Help

The Russian Central Research Institute of Machine Building is
conducting tests to see if plasma thrusters on spacecraft will
interfere with radio communication. The SpEx experiment asks radio
amateurs worldwide to listen for a packet downlink on 145.825 MHz
from the International Space Station. Spex will be on from 1650 UTC
November 25 to 0825 UTC November 28, and again from 1650 UTC December
2 to 0825 UTC December 5. For more information see
tinyurl.com/iss-spex

-- AMSAT News Service

3. Quebec School contacts ISS

An Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) contact
was successful for A.S.J. Memorial High School, Thetford Mines,
Québec,on Monday, November 14 at 15:41 UTC. The school formed a space
club and students were taught about the ISS, radio equipment and
radio protocol.

-- AMSAT News Service

4. Ham Radio on "Last Man Standing"

Amateur radio will become an ongoing part of the American television
comedy, "Last Man Standing." Star Tim Allen will have various pieces
of ham gear, and possibly some copies of CQ magazine, on his office
desk. His character will be identified as a licensed ham, with a
fictional call sign.

Producer John Amodeo, NN6JA, warns that, at least at first, ham
radio's presence will be only visual, and has not yet been worked
into any scripts.

-- CQ News Service

5. CQ WorldWide Submissions Increase

John K1AR reports that at least 7025 logs were received for the CQ
WorldWide SSB contest as the deadline passed -- an increase of more
than 1000 over the previous all-time total. The increase is
attributed to the combination of new ham populations around the
world, great high-band propagation, and the ease of submitting
electronic logs.

-- ARRL Contest Update