AmateurRadio.com

It was a week in which I tried to get some loose ends fixed. I finished the SLA battery charger after I got the 1R8 resistors from my favourite supplier, did the family finances and tried to get the home-directory on my laptop cleared of some junk. In the process I upgraded my logging software, which is CQRlog. It was a major upgrade since the author switched to another back-end database, so it messed up my log quite a bit. I sorted that out and now everything is back in order again.

In the process I noticed that there was an option to look up data on hamQTH.com. Having never heard of this site I checked it out and found it to be a light-weight version of QRZ.com, or as they claim on the web site: Free Hamradio Callbook. It was set up by the authors of CQRlog, Petr (OK2CQR) and Martin (OK1RR). The reason, according to their web site:

Since the owner of one popular server decided to hide all addresses until you are not registered, I decide to write my own. This callbook provides all information for free because you entered data to callbook for free and didn’t get paid for it. So it won’t be right to ask for a payment if you want to publish your data.

Petr’s English is a little crooked, but he means: “At QRZ.com you have to register (and pay) to get access to data that you and others gave for free. With us your info remains free.” You might recall that QRZ.com restricted the xml access to their database last June, shutting out some logging software from auto-filling in some data fields. They also limited
look-ups by registered and non-registered users and hide address details to non-registered users on their web page.

I usually steer clear of web sites that are set up because of frustration about another web site. But this one got me thinking and there is an analogy that came to mind. About 18 years ago a couple of guys set up a CD database, with users contributed content, called CDDB. It grew phenomenally and a company was formed to manage it, which was sold off and made the owners rich men. The new owners then said the info in the database would stay freely accessible, but in
the end the database (with data which users gave for free) was closed for most software packages which accessed it. And if you ever ripped a CD you know how annoying it is to not have access to a database with song titles. Luckily the database had already been cloned and freedb had been set up to replace CDDB.

Now I am not a lazy person and I have always typed in my logs by hand. But with hamQTH.com I now have an auto-fill function available for CQRlog, something I have to pay US$29.95 for with QRZ.com. You could argue that there is no such thing as a free lunch and that QRZ.com has grown to be the default standard. I agree that bills have to be paid and money has to be made. But I also come from a free world and believe in creating and sharing your work for every one’s benefit. As a result I have been using and contributing to the GNU/Linux operating system for over a decade already. My contribution may not have been big, but it doesn’t have to be so: many small contributions do make a huge difference. A contribution of US$29.95 a year is kind of steep in my world. So I give hamQTH.com a thumbs up and have updated my profile with the latest info. If only I had discovered them last weekend when the All Asian contest was going on. Would have saved me a lot of typing.

This weekend is Mid-Autumn Festival in the Chinese world. Look out for some extra activity from East Asia and don’t choke on your moon cakes.

73 de Hans (BX2ABT)

Everyone remembers what they were doing when they found out about the 9/11 attacks. I remember it because I had a bad migraine that day, rather like the one that turned out to be a harbinger of my brain tumour. I switched off the computer, drew the curtains in the bedroom, lay down on the bed and switched on the radio. Instead of the expected classical music there were voices talking about a plane that had crashed into the World Trade Centre. For a few minutes I lay there thinking I was listening to some “mockumentary” radio play like the famous Orson Welles “aliens have handed” spoof. But something told me that wasn’t right, so I went downstairs, turned on the TV and saw that this was all too real.

Today I hope against hope that we get through this anniversary day without another terrorist attack attempt. I just don’t understand why anyone would want to give up their life, and end the lives of other innocent people, for any “cause”. One thing being diagnosed with an incurable brain tumour has made me realize is that life is too short to waste getting angry about things you don’t agree with.. Wouldn’t the world be a better place if we could all banish negative thoughts, focus on enjoying life as best we can with those we love, and make peace even with our enemies?

Series Four Episode nineteen of the ICQ Podcast has been released. News Stories include :-

• Special Event Stations mark tenth anniversary of 9/11 
• Battle of Britain special event station 
• Attacker kills W9WPH on hiking trip
• Scout amateur radio team on Mount Snowdon 
• 6th form students space project
• Second Japanese D-Star reflector 
• Codar Radar on 24 MHz ended 
• OH8X Tower Jump 
• Full licences at Mid Ulster Amateur Radio Club 
• Asteroid fly-by receiving opportunity
• LED lighting causes radio interference
• 15 months for teen radio pirate
• UK Propagation charts for September 2011
• New 2m repeater channels
• Take your hand-held to work' day

Your feedback and Martin (M1MRB reports from a SSB Field Day.

Series Four Episode nineteen of the ICQ Podcast has been released. News Stories include :-

• Special Event Stations mark tenth anniversary of 9/11 
• Battle of Britain special event station 
• Attacker kills W9WPH on hiking trip
• Scout amateur radio team on Mount Snowdon 
• 6th form students space project
• Second Japanese D-Star reflector 
• Codar Radar on 24 MHz ended 
• OH8X Tower Jump 
• Full licences at Mid Ulster Amateur Radio Club 
• Asteroid fly-by receiving opportunity
• LED lighting causes radio interference
• 15 months for teen radio pirate
• UK Propagation charts for September 2011
• New 2m repeater channels
• Take your hand-held to work' day

Your feedback and Martin (M1MRB reports from a SSB Field Day.

Gibson Girl Survival Radio. Photograph by Arnold Reinhold on Wikimedia Commons (using Creative Commons share-alike 3.0 license)

I have recently finished reading “Unbroken” by Lauren Hillenbrand which is a compelling and in parts disturbing account of the life and especially the World War II exploits of the US Olympic runner Louie Zamperini. Within the book there is the mention of an emergency radio called a ‘Gibson Girl’ which I had not heard about.  Upon investigation I found details of the radio on Louis Meultsee’s website “Radio for the Warrior”.  He explains that this radio is derived from a German emergency radio, the NSG2 or Not Sende Gerät 2 which had been retrieved by the British during World War II.  They had copied the design and made their own called the ‘Dinghy Transmitter T-1333′. In 1941 another retrieved German set was sent to the USA and that led to the development of the SCR-578 which became know as the ‘Gibson Girl’.  This nickname is attributed to the curved sides of the radio which were to facilitate the gripping of the radio between the legs to aid the hand cranking of the generator.  This seems to have reminded people of the shape of the women drawn by Charles Dana Gibson in the late nineteenth century.

The German, British and American radios operated on the international distress frequency of 500kHz. Crystal controlled oscillators were used in the German and British radios, but the Americans used a valve based oscillator. A circuit diagram can be found at the ‘Radio for the Warrior’ website. Inside an enclosure in the radio was a reel of wire for the antenna (you can see the circular hinged door in the photograph above) which could be raised by a kite.  There was a variable capacitor for tuning the antenna (see the circuit diagram) which could be adjusted from a knob on the radio front.  Power was generated by hand cranking and there were two automatic modulation modes, which included ‘SOS’ and a long dash (presumably for direction finding) as well as a manual keying mode.  Beside the radio signal a light could be generated by the cranking of the set and modulated too.

Along with the kite there were a range of other included accessories that are listed here, plus a photograph of an operator who looks were much like he is not in a survival situation! An article about the radio with some focus on the kite came out in issue 93 of  ’The Kiteflier’.

After World War II the radio was continued to be produced and it moved into the shortwave bands by using the emergency frequencies of  8280 or 8364 kHz.

If anyone has one of these radios in their possession and has photograph or if they have used one I would be interested to hear.

Finally, if you want to know more of the Louise Zamperini story and do not expect to be reading the book ‘Unbroken’ then watch the video below.  If you think you may read the book then I strongly recommend not watching the video as it reveals so much of the story.

There have been events in history where individuals will always remember where they were, who they were with and what they were doing when the event happened.  For the generation of my grandparents, that day was December 7, 1941 when Pearl Harbor was attacked.  For the generation of my parents, that day was November 22, 1963 when President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas.  As I watched the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster unfold on January 28, 1986 I was certain this would be the day which I would clearly remember for the rest of my life and certainly hoped none other would ever prove to be greater.  After all, I was only 19 years old, in my first year of college and grew up in small town Texas.  By the way, I still do remember very much what I was doing, who I was with and where I was on that tragic day.

Tuesday, September 11, 2001 began just like every other day for me.  I woke up early (around 6 AM MT) I had showered, dressed and was downstairs drinking a cup of coffee and watching Fox News by 6:20 AM.  This was pretty much a morning ritual for me.  Because my commute was less than five minutes, I typically wouldn’t leave my apartment until around 6:45 or so.  On this day, I wasn’t in that big of a hurry.  I had been working long hours as I was planning to fly to London later that week.  It was shaping up to be a beautiful day in the mile high city and from what I could see while watching Fox News, New York City was also looking beautiful.

My apartment was relatively small.  From my kitchen I could hear the TV in the living room and heard the initial report of a plane hitting the World Trade Center.  The time was 6:46 AM MT (8:46 AM ET).  I stepped into the living room and watched/listened for updated news.  Initial reports was it was a small airplane (perhaps a sightseeing plane) which hit the WTC.  The Fox anchors talked about how clear the sky was overhead in NYC.  Thoughts of perhaps the pilot suffered a heart attack or aircraft malfunction were more or less what most believed had happened. 

As the time approached the top of the hour, I was really intrigued in what had happened.  I remember at the top of the hour Fox and Friends passed it off to Jon Scott who happens to be a pilot.  Again for several minutes the speculation into what had happened to the pilot or to the airplane was the topic of discussion.  Fox had switched to an anchor outside the studios and I was just about ready to turn the TV off and drive to the office.  Again, it looked like an accident and I would follow up with what happened once I got to the office.

As I was reaching for the remote, what I saw next on TV will forever be in my memory.  It was 7:03 AM MT (9:03 AM ET) when the outside live shot showed a second plane flying into the second tower of the World Trade Center. It became clear to me and to the entire nation that we were under attack.  Yes, one aircraft could accidentally hit the WTC, but two?  Absolutely not. It was also very clear the second plane was not a small sightseeing plane, but a large airliner. For the next 15 minutes or so I sat on the edge of my sofa watching the events unfold in New York City.  I (and certainly like many Americans) was in total dis-belief at what I had just watched happen. 

Part of my job responsibilities (both then and now) was/is to manage our business continuity and disaster recovery processes for the customer support organization at my company.  While we (at the time) didn’t have an office in the NYC area, I wanted to get into my office so that I could be prepared for what ever else might happen on this day.  At this time, only the two WTC towers had been attacked.  I was not aware there were two other planes.

I quickly drove to the office and of course most everyone had already heard about the attacks in NYC.  I’m asked by a colleague if I had heard of the events and said yes, I had watched the information regarding New York.  He said, but have you heard about Washington DC?  It soon became very clear this was not just an attack on New York and the World Trade Center.  This was much, much larger.

Internet access from the office became really slow with employees checking the various news sites, emailing friends and family.  We had small TV’s in the lobby of the building connected to a DirecTV feed and I went down to try to get more information.  I was not only concerned about what other attacks might be planned, but also on the WTC attack which I had watched earlier from my apartment.  I wanted to see what progress had been made on extinguishing the fires and of course get updates on the rescue efforts. 

I made it downstairs to one of the TV’s.  Smoke was still pouring from the top of both towers, within seconds  the south tower began to collapse. I honestly couldn’t believe what I was watching.  It wasn’t long after the south tower collapsed that we heard word of United Flight 93 crashing near Shanksville, PA.  I had already went back upstairs to make a few phone calls.  I remember hearing some employees talking about the north tower collapse.  Again…I just couldn’t believe it. 

At some point in the day, an announcement was made or perhaps there was a company email.  But what ever the delivery mechanism, the message was to let us all know that all employees had been accounted for.  I doubt very seriously if much work got done that day.  As I said, I was scheduled to fly to London in a few days.  After hearing about all flights being grounded for possibly a few days, I spoke to my boss and determined I would not be traveling as scheduled. 

I remember going home and making myself a fairly stiff drink.  Sometime around 9 PM I went out to the hot tub.  It was a cool evening and I remember looking up in the sky and seeing and hearing nothing.  This was odd as I lived near the flight path for Centennial Airport (KAPA) and Denver International (KDEN) is only about 25-30 miles and at just about any time of the day and evening you can see the planes coming in for landings and departing.  I do recall hearing a few jet fighters and seeing various types of military aircraft.  I’m sure this was the case over most every major metropolitan city. 

Like many Americans, I did a lot of praying and in doing so asked God a lot of questions.  I have tried to pray for peace each and every day since the attacks and pray for the those who are making sacrifices and sometimes the ultimate sacrifice to ensure our freedoms both at home and abroad. 

In 2005 through the course of two acquisitions, Oracle acquired Peoplesoft who had acquired JD Edwards in 2003.  On the four year anniversary of 9/11 I learned something I didn’t know previous.  While JD Edwards didn’t lose any employees in the attacks, Oracle had lost eight employees that day.  Most will know the name of one employee in particular.  This employee, along with many other brave individuals fought back in what possibly should be considered the first battle won over terrorism and that employee was Todd Beamer.  Todd and many other brave individuals fought back on United Flight 93.  While they gave their life, they did it so many others could live.  Of course we now suspect that Flight 93 was headed for the US Capitol Building or the White House. 

In 2007 I realized a childhood dream to get my amateur radio license.  I remembered the speech which President George W. Bush made in January 2002 when he announced the creation of the USA Freedom Corps.  During that State of the Union address, President Bush asked Americans to serve a cause greater than themselves.  I answered that call by joining the Denver Police Depts. Volunteers in Policing Unit and DAREC, Denver Amateur Radio Emergency Communications.  In the course of just 3 years I had volunteered over 250 hours in that program. 

Yes it is easy to say “I’ll never forget”.  Through illness or old age there may come a time when I just don’t remember.  But for now, I will remember and each year on September 11th (as I have done for the past 9 years), I’ll wake up early and I’ll go downstairs, make a cup of coffee, turn on the TV (yes Fox News Channel) and I’ll say a little prayer and prepare myself to watch, to remember and even cry a little. I hope all American’s will remember, I hope all American’s will pray and I hope all American’s will cry a little. 

Thank you for reading and for allowing me to cross post this across my different blogs.

God Bless the United States of America.

Jerry