Location: Town
of Oyster Ice Skating Center, Community Room 1, Bethpage,
N.Y.
John, W2GW, the LIDXA President, called to order the meeting
of January 19 at 8:30 PM. Members present included W2GW, K2MAU, W2ABK
and OM Bruce, W2FGD, K2MFY, KA2D, N2YBB, N2KA, W2VZQ and XYL Marilyn, N2AJ and
XYL Margaret, N2DXJ and XYL Tanis.
In terms of DX, specific activities were highlighted:
·
A major DXpedition
to the Kurdistan area in Northern Iraq is scheduled for early April. The callsign assigned is YI9PSE.
·
Several members
reported hearing/working the DXpedition, CEØZA, at Juan Fernandez Island. They operators
are expected to be on the island until early February.
·
Currently active
from the South Cook Islands is AD7AF as E51WWA.
Around February 1 he will be traveling to the North Cook Islands and will
operate using the callsign E51WWB. He will
remain active there until mid-February.
·
Towards the end
of January a DXpedition is set to activate the Austral islands as TX3D. The operation should continue until early
February.
It was
reported that the sunspots numbers have started to improve. Sporadic openings have been noted on 15
meters. Good conditions are usually found
daytime on 17 meters and 20 meters and later on 30 meters and the lower bands.
John welcomed all members back after the New Years
and hoped that sunspot Cycle 24 would start to bring some exotic DX and better
conditions to the bands. Starting the
business portion of tonight’s meeting was the approval of the November 17 2009 meeting minutes. There was no
meeting in December due to the club’s annual Holiday party. Except for some minor corrections, these
minutes were accepted as presented. In
addition, the minutes were prepared in advance by the club’s Secretary Ed, K2MFY,
and sent out to the membership with the January meeting notice. Thanks to the efforts of KE2LJ, Pat, these
minutes appear in the LIDXA web site at: http://www.qsl.net/lidxa.
John, W2GW, LIDXA Treasurer, gave the Treasurer’s
report. John also reminded the
membership that the annual due of $20 for the year 2010 is now required by all
members. He announced that he was
sending out a check to the ARRL to cover the annual cost of the club sponsorship
of the ARRL DC contest plaque for the high-score world 21MHZ SSB category. This year’s ARRL DX contest will be held the
weekend of February 20–21 (CW) and March 6–7 (SSB).
Ed mentioned that we had a good turnout at the LIDXA
annual Holiday party on December 10 at
the Star Diner in Hicksville.
About 15 club members and guests were present. A picture of the group appears on the LIDXA
website. The club thanked Ed for all his
efforts in arranging the dinner.
John spoke briefly about the success of this year’s
Ham Radio University (HRU) 2010, held on
Sunday, January 10, 2010 at the Briarcliffe College in Bethpage. Featured were almost 25 different forums
covering all areas of ham radio. Members
of the club, W2GW, N2AJ, and W2FGD, presented a number of topics for our 1-1/2 hours “DX Program” presentation, hosted by W2GW.
Mike, N2YBB spoke about his recent guest operation
from the UN Headquarters as 4U1UN back in October. A number of notable DXers participated in the
month-long event, including OH2BH, K2LE, KR2Q, PY5EG, etc. Complete details are covered in the February
issue of QST.
Marv, W2FGD mentioned that AA2MF, at a frequency of
145.770 MHz, is still operational for the DX cluster. It is one of the few local 2 meter clusters
in the NYC-LI area that is accessible via RF without the internet.
Tom, KA2D, indicated that scheduled for the March 2010
LIDXA meeting, members of the Yankee Clipper Contest Club (YCCC) would be
discussing the advantages of joining this
special purpose (contest) club. Detailed
resources available for members are on the YCCC web site (http://www.yccc.org).
Ed mentioned about some of the emergency frequencies
that were set aside for handling earthquake traffic into and out of Haiti.
Marv reminded the membership to check-in at the LIDXA
weekly nets on Sunday night at 9 PM local time on the Grumman Hauppauge
repeater at 145.330/144.730 MHz (with 136.5 Hz PL), to get the latest
information on club matters and events.
At the conclusion of the business portion of
tonight’s meeting a video of the October 2008 operation from Willis Island in
the Coral Sea was shown. This DXpedition,
operating under the callsign VK9DWX, was sponsored by the German Bavarian DX
Contest Club.
This meeting concluded at around 9:45 PM after all the scheduled
business and entertainment had finished.
The next meeting is scheduled for Tuesday February 16, 2010.
______________________________________
Ed Whitman, K2MFY
LIDXA Secretary