Archive - August 2021

Bonaire Amateur Radio Club formed PJ4BAR

27 August 2021

As of 2021, there are 9 radio amateurs who actually live permanently on the island and who are also active.

Apart from that at least six PJ4-callsigns were issued to amateurs who live outside Bonaire, but who have an address on the island, so the group have decided to start their own radio club — Bonaire Amateur Radio Club (BAR: club callsign is PJ4BAR).

The club meets weekly at the Tera Cora Ranch from 18:00 hours until late at night. To celebrate this, BAR has organized a field day on the seafront at Sorobon Beach between August 27-29th.
BAR currently has a Web page under construction at: http://www.pj4bar.club
QSL PJ4BAR via M0URX.

Re-posted

12 August 2021

Two Bureau packages have been re-posted to Turkey and Belarus after they were returned from their respective Customs for no “Pre-Advice Electronic Data” The IARU are reluctant to provide the data we need to send Bureau parcels because the IARU believe that this data contravenes GDPR regulations.

Since posting these again the Turkey QSL Bureau was again returned by customs. Sorry TA hams… This is a problem that only IARU can sort out. 

There are many countries now that do not allow any import of packages that do not have Pre advice Electronic Data. The Universal Postal Union made it compulsory for ALL International parcels to provide the following data, the recipient’s name, telephone number and email address must be supplied electronically.

However, when reading the regulations, it is clear that “Personal Communications” (QSL Cards) are exempt from the regulations. It is though for the customs of the recipient country to determine if they allow the parcel to be forwarded to the recipient, returned or destroyed. Sending Bureau cards is a lot more complicated these days. 

3Y0J Bouvet 2022

11 August 2021
Press Release #4 from 3Y0J team
3Y0J DXpedition to Bouvet Island, November 2022
The 3Y0J team are delighted to inform about our continued effort to activate Bouvet island. After cancellation of the previous attempt due to the ill-fated sale of the vessel Braveheart we decided to continue the effort and search for a suitable and affordable vessel.

Today we announce that we have signed a contract with an expedition vessel with a proven track record and experienced polar crew that will take us to Bouvet in November 2022. The vessel is MARAMA and is fully booked for the 2021/2022 season. The cost is significantly reduced compared to our previous Braveheart charter. With the signing of the vessel contract we will start fundraising immediately. On this journey to Bouvet we have assembled a team of 12 operators and we plan to spend 20 days around Bouvet. The QTH at Bouvetøya will be Cape Fie at the South East part of the island, the only feasible part where a DXpedition can safely setup the camp on rocky ground, we will not set camp on the glacier. We will have a wide area of 150 x 800 ft to setup the camp and the antenna farm.

Back in April 2020 we started our effort to activate Bouvetoya – a Norwegian DXCC in South Atlantic Ocean and also known as the world’s most remote island. In close co-operation with NPI we received the needed permits in September 2020 to activate Bouvetoya, which also included a helicopter permit. We also together with NPI researched and was provided photos that showed a beach landing was possible. In November 2020 we were approached by Intrepid and we joined our efforts. After the sale of Braveheart in June we informed Intrepid that we would continue our effort to activate Bouvetoya and search for a suitable and affordable vessel. Last week we were ready to launch the vessel news to the team members. As we sent out this information it was leaked to Intrepid group which caused Intrepid in a hurry to send out a press release the following day that they would go to Bouvet. The act of the team member came as a big surprise to us, the same did the announcement from Intrepid as they were informed we would continue the project.

As of today we still hold the only valid amateur radio team license specifically issued for the purpose of activating Bouvet (3Y0J). With the NPI permits, the license, the signed vessel contract and a new expedition vessel we’re ready to move forward. The team of 12 operators will fund much of the budget but we also need the global DX Community to support our mission and help us make this important activation of the #2 most wanted DXCC entity. It is only through this kind of support that we can achieve our mission of making 120,000 contacts or more from Bouvet in November 2022. Without support there will be no activation.

In closing, we especially wish to thank our many Foundations, Clubs and Individual donors. Without this kind of support, operations to the world’s rarest entities would not be possible.
You can soon follow our plans from our website 3Y0J.NO (please note change of website to .no ) and the 3Y0J Facebook group.
Thank you,
Ken Opskar LA7GIA, Co-Leader
Rune Oye LA7THA, Co-Leader
Erwann Merrien LB1QI, Co-Leader

August Update

9 August 2021

K800 QSL-ZB2TTRobert ZB2TT reports that he is back in Gibraltar and has updated me with a missing 6m log from May. This is now on OQRS and LoTW. Monday’s are always a big day for log uploads here and just this morning i have updated log files for 5B4AHL, PJ4DX, PJ4EL, PJ4EVA, PJ4NX, VK100AF & VK8NSB.
We are now in the last few weeks activity for VK100AF which has produced over 20,000 Qs with almost 50 operators from around Australia from all States and Territories. Double QSL is available on OQRS.

5Z4VJ Andy, has updated me with a couple of logs from July, uploaded to OQRS this morning. Andy is in the UK for a couple of weeks and returns to Kenya later in August.

I have received many emails in recent weeks with inquiries and requesting help, I cannot stress this enough, if you email me, please introduce yourself and use the words please and thank you. I can assure you that it will help your inquiry get a satisfactory solution. Otherwise my delete key gets used. If you have a “Missing / Not in log” Inquiry then in the first instance… CHECK the “Last QSO in Log” on the OQRS log search. If the log is up to date then use the “NOT IN LOG” form. Emails should NOT be sent for this. Please use the form. Your inquiry will be sent to my work queue.
If you are not able to use OQRS and want to send your QSL by post then please always check the QSL Policy for that call sign either on my website or QRZ.com. Insufficient funds will be sent Via Bureau and that includes UK hams too!

Our team continues every month to work to improve and introduce new tools and functions on OQRS for everyone, DX’ers, DXpeditions, Team leaders, satellite operations and QSL Manager functionality. So thank you to our OQRS software guys!