RAC Bulletin 131221

RAC Ontario Sections Bulletin for December 21, 2013

NATIONAL NEWS

1. RAC 0-30 MHz Band Planning Committee

Al Penney, VO1NO has agreed to chair RAC's 0-30 MHz Band Planning
Committee. The previous chair, Jim Fisher, VE1JF has retired but will
continue to serve the BPC for a time. Other continuing committee
members include Scott Wood VE1QD, Mel Martin VE2DC, Don Moman VE6YJ,
and Frank Vanderzande VE7AV.

Al was first licensed in 1977. He has been active on all bands from
160M to microwave, and enjoys DXpeditions for IOTA and VHF/UHF
contests. He is a past president of the VE2CMR Club, Halifax Amateur
Radio Club, Pikes Peak Radio Amateur Association in Colorado
Springs, and the West Carleton Amateur Radio Club in Ottawa. He is
currently President of the Greenwood Amateur Radio Club in Nova
Scotia.

-- RAC Bulletin Service

ONTARIO SECTIONS NEWS

ITEMS OF INTEREST

2. December Newsletters

The December 2013 issue of QNI, the independent newsletter of the
National Traffic System, is now available online in PDF format, at
ve3gna.wordpress.com.

The December issue of SatMagazine is now online and can be downloaded
in PDF format at www.satmagazine.com/download.php.

The European Radio Amateurs' Organization Winter Newsletter is now
online, and can be downloaded at www.eurobureauqsl.org/newsletter
This newsletter comes out quarterly, and can be read either in PDF
or as a web page.

-- Glenn Killam VE3GNA, and AMSAT News

3. Voice of Russia ending shortwave broadcasts

Voice of Russia (VOR), the former Radio Moscow during the USSR era,
will cease shortwave broadcasts as of January 1, 2014.

Voice of Russia currently broadcasts to 160 countries in 38 languages
for 151 hours per day on short and medium waves, on FM, via
satellite, and via the Internet. Earlier this year shortwave
transmissions were cut to 26 hours a day in all languages, down from
more than 50 hours a day in 2012.

-- ARRL Web

4. ARRL Offers Free QST Articles

Beginning December 2, a selected article from each issue of QST will
be made available to non-members and non-hams on the Web at
www.arrl.org/this-month-in-qst. The open-access articles will be
posted for downloading during the first week of each issue month.

The December article is "Colorado Flooding and Ham Radio: Public
Service at its Finest" by Sean Kutzko, KX9X, ARRL Publication
Relations Manager.

-- ARRL Web

5. Juno hears hams say "HI"

On October 9, NASA's interplanetary Juno spacecraft detected Amateur
Radio signals transmitting "HI" as it looped past Earth for a
gravity-assisted boost on its way to Jupiter. More than a thousand
radio amateurs around the world spread out across 10 meters to
transmit "HI" in very slow speed CW, sending 30 second dits
punctuated by 30 second spaces and 90 seconds between characters.

"The second 'HI' was detected clearly," according to researcher Don
Kirchner, KD0L. The experiment involved 16 identical rounds and ran
a bit longer than 2-1/2 hours. The object of the experiment was to
see if Juno's onboard "Waves" experiment could detect the
collaborative RF.

-- ARRL Web