Zack, After flying home yesterday, I'm able to sit down and get caught up on e-mails and other stuff. The weekend was fun - both at the Hamvention, and my travel around that part of the country before flying home. :-)
> In addition to Patrick's email, I thought I would throw in my 2 cents of the > events on Friday. It was great getting to meet a few new faces including > finally getting to meet Patrick, WD9EWK, face-to-face! It was good to meet many who have been on the air in the past couple of years, since my last trip to Dayton. I was a on a plane to Australia during the start of the 2011 Hamvention. I had no interruptions from my office during this trip, which was much better than in 2010 when I missed the banquet due to an issue that kept me on the phone with the office for almost 4 hours! > Thank you to the stations that we worked on Friday - the crowd was very > attentive during the operations and many showed interest in getting started > with satellite operations. I was at the AMSAT demo area all day Friday, and > it was nice hearing all of the familiar calls and voices still on the air > after my recent absence due to school. Keith, W5IU and Roger, WA9ZPL put a > lot of time and effort into these demos, and I know they appreciate the > participation. They deserve a nice round of cyber applause for their > commitment over the many years. Keith and Roger were very happy to put others on the mic at the demo station. Along with the passes I worked Friday afternoon, I also worked some passes Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning. I heard and saw Doug KD8CAO on the mic Saturday morning, and I worked Doug on a VO-52 pass when I was on the Indiana/Ohio state line Saturday morning. If nobody else was around to move the antenna array, Keith or Roger would happily do that. I was told of a ham from southern Indiana (Ken KC9TTR) who visited the Hamvention over the weekend. Ken took interest in the AMSAT booths, saw demonstrations, and decided to give this a try. He bought an Arrow antenna, took it home, and on Sunday he tried SO-50. On one pass at the end of the Hamvention, the crowd (including a couple of people who know him) heard his call come through. Later in the afternoon, he worked me while I was parked on the Indiana/Ohio state line after the Hamvention. He e-mailed me, saying that I was his first satellite contact, and asking how he needed to log the contact in LOTW so he would see the confirmation for both states. Not long after I replied to him and uploaded my QSOs from Sunday, he saw the confirmations in his LOTW account, and two states via satellite toward WAS. AMSAT does a great job with its presence at the Hamventions, with the booth located next to the larger ARRL presence and the demonstration area outside. The Hamvention does a great job of supporting AMSAT. They provide a fenced area for the demos, and give a contribution to AMSAT at each of the last few Hamventions (including this year). 73! Patrick WD9EWK/VA7EWK http://www.wd9ewk.net/ _______________________________________________ Sent via [email protected]. Opinions expressed are those of the author. Not an AMSAT-NA member? Join now to support the amateur satellite program! Subscription settings: http://amsat.org/mailman/listinfo/amsat-bb
