MINUTES
OF LIDXA INC. MEETING— October 17, 2003
Location:
Briarcliffe College, Bethpage, N.Y.
The LIDXA President, Marty, NN2C, called the meeting of October 17 to order at 8:18 PM. Members present (per sign-in on the blackboard) included K2MFY, NN2C, KE2LJ, W2FGD, N2KA, N2FF, N2TU, W2GW (and XYL, KC2MAU), and AG2A. Marty also welcomed guests Stan, N2YKT and Al, N2ZUU.
In terms of DX, specific activities were highlighted:
·
The recent DXpedition to Annobon Island as 3CØV
has ended prematurely due to demands from the military commander on the
island. No further details were
available except that the team was back in Spain with all their equipment.
·
A DXpedition to Easter Island by several Polish hams is expected
shortly. They will be on Easter Island
for a few weeks and would be operational in the CQ WorldWide SSB Contest next
weekend.
·
Conditions on the HF
bands are starting to improve.
Presently propagation seems best on 17, 20, 40 and 30 meters; however
there have been some good openings on 15 meters and brief openings on 10
meters.
·
The weekend of October
25–26 will be the CQ WorldWide Contest–SSB mode. For US stations the exchange is signal report (usually 59) and
WAZ zone (Ø5 for local stations here).
Starting the business portion of tonight’s meeting
was the approval of the September 19, 2003 meeting minutes. These minutes were prepared in advance by
the club’s secretary, Ed, K2MFY, and sent out to the membership with the
October meeting notice. Thanks to the
efforts of KE2LJ, Pat, these minutes also appear (unapproved) in the LIDXA Web
site: http://www.qsl.net/lidxa.
Club treasurer, John, W2GW gave a Treasurer’s report. The only known expense expected is the cost for renewal of the annual liability insurance. The club also congratulated John’s XYL, Louise, on her new Technician ham license of KC2MAU.
Ed mentioned that he had completed the paperwork to reactivate the LIDXA as an ARRL affiliated club. Somehow our affiliation had been deleted when the League moved the renewal/update operation to the Web. Ed expected to mail the papers to the ARRL early next week.
LIDXA member
Frank Fallon, N2FF, incumbent Hudson Division Director, spoke briefly about the
forthcoming Hudson Division election for the ARRL for the Director
position. Ballots have gone out to
Hudson Division members of the ARRL.
Frank is facing a challenge from the current Vice Director and former
Director, Steve Mendelsohn, W2ML, of New Jersey.
Frank also discussed the
League’s position on the Broadband over Power Line (BPL) threat to the HF
bands. He urged all amateurs to review
the ARRL news on this issue at the ARRL Web site. A brief discussion developed on the consequences of interference
to all the amateur bands from BPL. The
membership voted to donate $25 to the League’s fund against BPL. John made out the check and Ed said he would
download the donation form from the ARRL Web site and mail them out this check.
The new (final) release of the ARRL’s, “Logbook of
the World” (LoTW) has been launched as of September 15. Details and downloads can be found at http://www.arrl.org/lotw/. Several members mentioned that they had
registered with LOTW and uploaded some of their logs.
A brief discussion developed on the club’s annual
Holiday party. A number of members said
they would be able to attend. It was
felt if the attendance was high, we might have the party at Mary’s Backyard restaurant
in Plainview. As an alternate, it was
not certain if we would be able to have the party at the Sweet Hollow Diner
in Melville, as was done the last few years.
It was tentatively decided to have the party on the evening of Wednesday
December 10. The next LIDXA meeting
would firm up the date and restaurant.
Marty
mentioned that the next 2004 Ham Radio University (HRU) planning meeting is set
for October 20 in the Emergency Operations Center, Babylon Town Hall, North
Lindenhurst, NY. HRU 2004 is now scheduled for Sunday, January 18,
2004, at East Woods School, Oyster Bay, Long Island, New York. A Web site for HRU 2004 has been set
up at http://www.huson.arrl.org/nli/hru2004.htm. Last year the club hosted the DX Forum at the
HRU. Marty said we would probably
present the same agenda, but he was hoping we would be able to get a classroom
that would be larger and more centrally located.
The
business portion of the meeting then concluded at 8:55 PM.
At this time, a video was shown on the February 1994 DXpedition (as 3YØPI) to Peter 1 Island, down in the Antarctic, by an international team of Norwegian, Belgian, Swiss, and American amateurs. Over 70,000 QSOs were made from this remote island down under.
This meeting then concluded at around 9:25 PM after all the scheduled business and entertainment had finished. The next meeting of the LIDXA is scheduled on Friday November 21.
______________________________________
Ed Whitman, K2MFY
LIDXA Secretary