Archived News Script
IRTS Radio News Bulletin Sunday 5th October 2014
Amateur Station Licence Examination
The next Amateur Station Licence Examination will be held on Thursday, 27th November in the ComReg Offices in Dublin. Full details, including entry procedure, examination fee and how to pay the fee on line are available at www.irts.ie/exam . Please note that it is necessary to download the application form from the web page and forward the completed form and the appropriate fee so as to secure a place for the examination. If you pay the fee on line you must still complete and forward the application form. The closing date for receipt of completed applications is Tuesday 11th November. Three Exam Reports which were previously published in Echo Ireland are now available on the Downloads section of the website at www.irts.ie/downloads under Studying for the Harmonised Amateur Radio Examination Certificate. These reports contain very useful information for anyone studying for the Licence Examination
IARU Region 1 Conference
The 23rd triennial General Conference of IARU Region 1 was held from 21 to 25 September in Varna-Albena, Bulgaria. There were 43 Member Societies present and a further 17 were represented by proxy IRTS held the proxy for Bahrein. The Society was represented at the Conference by the President, Séamus EI8BP and Seán EI7CD the IARU Liaison Officer. Dave Court EI3IO had been invited by IARU to act a Secretary to Committee C5 dealing with VHF/UHF/SHF matters. IRTS went to the Conference with three main objectives, firstly to get Dave Court EI3IO elected to the Region 1 Executive Committee, secondly to have the Conference adopt a position on remote controlled operation on the basis of two papers submitted by IRTS and finally to seek to host the 2017 Conference in Ireland. We were successful in the first two of these but unfortunately we were seriously out priced on the cost of the Conference. The 2017 conference will now be held near Munich in Germany. A new Executive Committee was elected for the region and the new Regional President is Don Beattie G3BJ. A full report on the Conference will be included in the next issue of Echo Ireland.
ATV Activity:
Ronnie EI9ED reports that EI2SDR is sending pictures of Dublin Bay on frequency 2390 MHz from 3Rock. It is on test and orientated towards Dublin and Dundalk. Rx Input 1240 MHz will be available next with DTMF Control via 144.775. More information later.
Information on the recent SARL 5 MHz Beacon
Frequency change
At a recent meeting with their regulator, ICASA, SARL - the South African Radio League - reached an agreement to exchange their 5 MHz channel at 5250 kHz, (used for propagation experiments), for the more common beacon channel of 5290 kHz.
On Oct 4th, ZS6KTS and other stations in the South African 5 MHz WSPR Beacon Cluster changed over to 5290 kHz The other South African channel at 5260 kHz remains in use as normal for general contacts
MREN Annual Rally
The Mayo Radio Rally 2014 is on Sunday 12th October. (2 weeks time) The usual traders will be in attendance and are happy to bring along any items you wish to purchase for collection at the rally, especially large and bulky items like antennas, cable etc. Please contact them with your orders and they will be happy to oblige. Doors open at 11 am and admission is €5 per person (children are free).IRTS stand for QSL Cards will be available. A Bring & Buy, carvery, disabled facilities, and much more on the day. Full details of the hotel packages and the latest information on equipment for sale at the Radio Rally is available on the club website www.ei7mre.org Due to high demand, anyone wishing to reserve a table, or anyone interested in setting up a stall, should contact Padraig Baynes (EI9JA) on 087 6957154, or alternatively via email to pbaynes1 at eircom dot net, as soon as possible to avoid disappointment.
Venue: Welcome Inn Hotel in Castlebar, Co Mayo, For GPS info: LAT: 53.859574 LON: -9.297781 Loc8 Code: FY4 – 44 -NS4,
Limerick Radio Club
The next meeting of Limerick Radio Club will take next Wednesday evening 8th October at 19.30 at the Limerick Institute of Technology. New members and anyone interested in Amateur Radio, are welcome to attend.
South Eastern Amateur Radio Group
The South Eastern Amateur Radio Group were QRV as EI2WRC/P from The Waterford & Suir Valley Railway, Kilmeaden, Co. Waterford on Saturday and Sunday 27th & 28th September to coincide with the Railways On The Air Weekend. Band conditions on both days were excellent and a large number of QSO’s including many of the UK train stations taking part in the weekend were logged. There were a large number of visitors to Kilmeaden Station on both days and many people were interested in the amateur radio station in operation. Needless to say both the members of SEARG and the junior ops enjoyed the train journey out alongside the river Suir with magnificent scenery on the trip. Kilmeaden Station was the only EI train station active in the Railways On The Air Weekend and it has been a popular site for SEARG activations over the past few years. SEARG would like to thank Maria Kyte manager of the Waterford & Suir Valley Railway for allowing us to use the station for our activations. For more information and details about The Waterford & Suir Valley Railway please see www.wsvrailway.ie
The South Eastern Amateur Radio Group would like to thank all the people who donated to our recent collection for the The Southern Ireland Repeater Network Maintenance & Up-Keep Fund. Your generosity is very much appreciated. Thanks also to Lisa Cummins EI9GSB and all her colleagues at the North Cork Radio Group for allowing us to place the collection box at their annual rally.
The South Eastern Amateur Radio Group will be hosting the 83rd IRTS Dinner AGM & Radio Rally in Hotel Kilkenny, College Road, Kilkenny on 25th & 26th of April 2015. Tickets for the annual dinner which will be held on the Saturday evening at 7:00 pm are now available from John Ronan EI7IG. Tickets are priced at €35 each. Please note that admission to the dinner is strictly by ticket only.
For up-to-date news about the South Eastern Amateur Radio Group and it’s actives you can check our website www.searg.com and you can also follow us on Facebook and Twitter.
DX News
Pelikan Key, a small island off the coast of St. Maarten in the Caribbean, will be activated for the first time between 6 – 10 October. Two EI operators will be part of the DXpedition Team. Jeremy EI5GM and Dave EI9FBB along with Dom 3Z9DX, Frans J69DS and Col MM0NDX plan to sign PJ7PK on all bands 40 -10m CW and SSB. The new IOTA reference number is NA-247. QSL Manager is 3Z9DX.
A major German DXpedition will be active as T30D from Western Kiribati until 15 October. Four stations are planned to be operational around the clock on all bands 160 – 6m on CW, SSB and RTTY. QSL Manager is DL4SVA.
Following on from the recent visit to Christmas Island where they signed VK9AN, Rob N7QT and Melanie AB1UH , are now in the Austral Islands where they have the callsign TX5Z. They will be there until 13 October.
Markus DJ4EL will be QRV as 5Z4/DJ4EL from Lamu Island, off the coast of Kenya until 19 October. Operation will be on all bands 40 – 10m SSB. The IOTA reference for Lamu Island is AF-040.
Items for inclusion in next week’s Radio News can be submitted via e-mail to “newsteam /at/ irts / dot / ie” for automatic forwarding to both the radio and printed news services. Urgent news items for the radio news may be telephoned to the radio news editor, Aidan, EI7JC on 085 7100511.
Please note that items for the radio news should reach the editor no later than midday on Thursday in order to be guaranteed inclusion in the following Sunday’s bulletin.
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