[Alexandria Radio Club Reflector] REMINDER: Virginia QSO Party is this Coming Weekend, Starts 10 a.m. Saturday

[Don Lewis]

The Virginia QSO Party (VaQP) will take place this weekend.  It is an
annual amateur radio event that encourages ham operators to make contacts
with Virginia’s 95 counties and 39 independent cities. It is typically held
during the third full weekend in March.  VaQP is one of many state QSO
parties held annually.



VaQP 2026 Event Details (Dates and Times):

Start Date: March 21, 2026

End Date: March 22, 2026

Operating Hours: 10:00 AM to 8:00 PM (local time)



Sponsor: The event is organized by the Sterling Park Amateur Radio Club
(SPARC) <https://www.qsl.net/sterling/home.htm> and takes place across
Virginia, and extends outside of Virginia.



Participation and Awards: Event is open to all amateur radio operators,
regardless of license class.  Individuals and clubs are encouraged to join
and compete for awards.



Participants can earn various certificates and plaques based on their
performance. All participants who submit a log will receive a certificate.
Plaques are awarded for all categories of stations, including single
operator and multi-operator stations, and clubs.



Additional Information:  For more details, including rules and scoring,
participants can visit the official Virginia QSO Party website. See link
below.



As a tradition, for many years, Gordon Miller (NQ4K), the Party
Coordinator, traveled to Alexandria to brief the Alexandria Radio Club on
the details of the upcoming annual VaQP.  This year, Gordon presented the
VaQP briefing at our March meeting via Zoom, see link below.  Annually,
Alexandria Radio Club donates to the VaQP to sponsor two award plaques.
Alexandria Radio Club also competes with the number of QSOs completed with
other Virginia clubs for a ranking amongst Virginia clubs.

As an important note, if you participate in the VaQP please make sure to
list Alexandria Radio Club as your club affiliation to boost our club
standing in rankings amongst Virginia clubs.  Using the N3FJP VaQP logging
program (it is free up to 30 QSOs), club affiliation can be submitted when
writing the log file to disk.

As an added incentive, VaQP is a great opportunity to test EMCOMM HF
capabilities using NVIS (Near Vertical Incident Skywave).  NVIS is an
important beyond-line-of- sight communications capability for a grid-down
situation.  NVIS can enable “eyes and ears” across Virginia about weather
and travel conditions, provisions, and the status of health and welfare.  A
good study is the December 2005 QST Magazine article, "What's the Deal
About NVIS," which discusses NVIS and the role of NVIS after the historic
Hurricane Katrina, attached.  Also attached is a 2023 Alexandria Radio Club
presentation on NVIS.

I will be testing my "fencetenna" (wire around the inside of the fence (9:1
match)) using NVIS during the VaQP.  I am available via Zoom to assist with
VaQP prep tomorrow evening. If there are questions, just send me an email.

73, Don, KI4D



VaQP Presentation via Zoom to ARC March club meeting

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Yf3C9gK4qhDUjnG8MPUchMy-hgPStAAB/view?usp=drive_link



VaQP Additional Information

https://www.qsl.net/sterling/VA_QSO_Party/2026_VQP/2026_VQP_Main.html



N3FJP State QSO Party Software

https://www.n3fjp.com/stateqsoparty.html



Near Vertical Incidence Skywave (NVIS) Antenna for Local HF Contacts

https://badger-fi.com/2019/02/13/nvis/
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