XM3PBX - Railway Mobile of the Polar Bear DX-pedition 98

The "Railway Mobile" section started on August 16th at 23:00 UTC, on the ONR's "NORTHLANDER" , at Toronto Ontario. XM3PBX operated phone only on 80, 40, 20 and 2 Meters. Operations continued until about 05:00 UTC August the 17th, as the train traveled north to Cochrane Ontario. At Cochrane, XM3PBX transferred to the ONR's "POLAR BEAR EXPRESS" . Phone operations continued on 40, 20 and 15 Meters from Cochrane to our destination, Moosonee Ontario. Conditions deteriorated about 2 hours into the trip and we only netted about 50 contacts. At Moosonee, XM3PBX was relocated in the ONR's Moosonee Train Station. Bad weather delayed setting up of the antennas and the station wasn't fully operational until August 18th. Operations continued on 80, 40, 20, 17, 15, and 6 Meters. A dedicated rig was set up to monitor the 6 Meter beacons continuously and as a communications link with VE8C on Charlton Island in James Bay. We also had a 2 Meter setup for local communications in Moosonee. Operations on the HF bands were all SSB mode with the exception of several CW contacts. On August 22nd at 18:00 UTC, XM3PBX was to move back on to the southbound "POLAR BEAR EXPRESS" and continue operations on the same frequencies of the northbound trip, but unfortunately, there was no space available in the rail coach to set up, so operations were suspended for that part of the journey. After an overnight stay in Cochrane, XM3PBX restarted operations on the ONR's southbound "NORTHLANDER" at about 11:00 UTC on 40, 20 and 2 Meters. Conditions were extremely poor, so operations mainly continued on 40 Meters until all operations ceased just north of Toronto Ontario, at 20:00 UTC, August 23, 1998. Even though propagation conditions were wildly unpredictable, XM3PBX was able to account for over 750 contacts worldwide.