Oakland County Michigan
Amateur Radio Public Service Corps

2008 Siren Test Schedule:

 

The first Saturday of each month at 1:00 p.m., with the following exceptions:

W8OAK Results
for SKYWARN Recognition Day 2007

Once again, the Oakland County ARPSC participated in Skywarn Recognition Day for the year 2007. The event is held on the last day of the Atlantic Hurricane season as a "thank you" from the NWS to all amateur radio operators for their assistance to the NWS over the previous year. The event ran from 0000-2400Z December 1, 2007 this year. The official site for Skywarn Recognition Day is at hamradio.noaa.gov and has lots of useful information.

Although it was the bottom of the sunspot cycle with its associated horrid propogation, we managed to make 27 contacts and hear 12 other stations. Echolink/IRLP was used for the first time this year, as the ether was not very conductive. Joe, KJ8O, contacted 7 stations via that mode from home using the W8OAK call, and we managed to hear 3 other stations on the mode via the MICON 440 machine. Before calling it a night at the EOC, Randy, WF5X, managed to work K8DTX (Detroit Weather) via the MICON repeater for the only RF contact of the night. All that trouble to put up a second antenna in the 20 degree cold and winde to have no paths to anywhere via HF that evening. Thanks for the help anyway to Myron (N8SMV) and KJ80. Joel, W8HIU, started out Saturday morning along with Joe, KJ8O, and had good luck on 40 mtr. Conditions were a bit better, but still rather finicky. Our first PSK31 contact was made on 20m around midday. As a teaser, we copied only the callsign for Fairbank, AK on PSK31 around mid-afternoon. What a bummer! Contacts were spotty and very difficult from then until the end at 1900 EDT. When all was tallied up, we had contacts with 27 stations and acquired 10 bonus points, for a total of 37 points, which fittingly qualified us for the Blizzard Certificate -- which is what it seemed to be outside when the second station antenna was taken down from in front of the EOC on Saturday evening.

Others stopping by the EOC and/or assisting in some capacity were:
Joel (WU8Y), and Greg (W8VIJ).