Soldiering On!
A big thank you to those wishing Peter well. He suffered a compound
fracture and was operated upon yesterday in a Cairns hospital. Willis
Island is approximately 458km East of Cairns, and Cairns is 1,400km North of
home, Brisbane.
Peter is actually the QSL manager for the DXpedition, so I'm sure some kind
words along with your QSL request and donations will go along way, hi!
Winds have picked up around the Island and one of the operators, who has a minor cut to his leg from another incident aboard the catamaran, is having to spend time aboard the cat. This is necessary so as to insure their only means of return transport doesn't float away in high winds and swell! There wasn't room aboard the cat for the fridge come anchor!!! (sorry, that's an in-joke there!)
Manpower - For most of the time VK9WI is manned by only three operators. Bear in mind they also like to eat, and get some sleep too. There have been many many requests for this and that and the team is attempting to satisfy everybody as best as possible. Having said that you will appreciate that only so much can be done with three ops. The highest priority is to give a new country to people on at least one band.
RTTY - Requests to look towards EU have been acknowledged. We will advise of times/freqs.
Operating Schedules - An operating schedule should be available in the next 24 hours. The operators have a fairly good idea of propagation by now and plan to get something together, even if it is basic. They would, (and I'm sure you would too) prefer them to spend their limited and valuable time actually on-air.
Logs - The 36 hours isn't up yet!!! Seriously, we are sorting out a few problems here, but rest assured they will be on-line soon.
Photo Gallery - Five pictures were added to the site last night. Click on the "Gallery" link. These were taken by a digital camera only yesterday. Watch out for more pictures of the operation soon. http://www.qsl.net/vk9wi/1willis_gallery.htm
73, from your pilots, Adam VK4CP & Bill G0VDE.