[CVRC] The ARRL Letter for August 5, 2010
ARRL Web site
memberlist at www.arrl.org
Thu Aug 5 15:08:08 EDT 2010
If you are having trouble reading this message, you can see the original at:
<http://www.arrl.org/arrlletter/?issue=2010-08-05>http://www.arrl.org/arrlletter/?issue=2010-08-05
August 5, 2010
Editor: <mailto:k1sfa at arrl.org>S. Khrystyne Keane, K1SFA
<http://www.arrl.org/>ARRL Home
Page<http://www.arrl.org/arrlletter/>ARRL
Letter<http://www.arrl.org/arrlletter/>
Archive<http://www.arrl.org/arrlletter/audio/>Audio
News<http://www.arrl.org/nladclick.php?n=al&i=2010-08-05&t=t>
* + ARRL Leadership : ARRL Board Meets in
Connecticut for Its 2010 Second Meeting
* + Public Service : FCC to Allow Government
Drills Without a Waiver as of September 3
* + It's a Bird, It's a Plane! No, It's an
Asteroid -- Asteroid (31531) ARRL, To Be Exact!
* + ARRL Facebook Page Tops 10,500 Fans
* + Active Sun Puts on Display for Earth
* ARRL in Action : What Have We Been Up to Lately?
* + Swiss Hams Set New World Record on 10 GHz
* + Solar Update
* This Week on the Radio
+ Available on <http://www.arrl.org/arrl-audio-news>ARRL Audio News
+ ARRL Leadership: ARRL Board Meets in Connecticut for Its 2010 Second Meeting
The ARRL Board of Directors held its Second
Meeting of 2010 July 16-17 in Windsor,
Connecticut, under the chairmanship of President
Kay Craigie, N3KN. International Amateur Radio
Union Secretary Rod Stafford, W6ROD, and Radio
Amateurs of Canada President Geoff Bawden,
VE4BAW, were guests of the Board. At the two-day
meeting, the Board considered a number of reports
and acted on several recommendations and
Directors' motions. Read more
<http://www.arrl.org/news/arrl-board-of-directors-meets-in-connecticut-for-2010-second-meeting>here.
+ Public Service: FCC to Allow Government Drills
Without a Waiver as of September 3
As of September 3, government agencies sponsoring
emergency or disaster drills involving Amateur
Radio operators will no longer need to apply for a waiver to hold such drills.
In July,
<http://www.arrl.org/news/fcc-modifies-amateur-rules-to-allow-participation-in-disaster-and-emergency-drills-on-behalf-of-an-e>the
FCC released a
<http://www.arrl.org/news/fcc-modifies-amateur-rules-to-allow-participation-in-disaster-and-emergency-drills-on-behalf-of-an-e>Report
and Order
(<http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/FCC-10-124A1.pdf>R&O)
that amended Part 97 -- more specifically
<http://edocket.access.gpo.gov/cfr_2002/octqtr/pdf/47cfr97.117.pdf>Section
97.113 -- stating that government entities
sponsoring disaster and emergency drills will no
longer need to apply for a waiver to hold these
drills. Additionally, employees who wish to
participate in non-government-sponsored drills
and exercises may do so under certain conditions.
Part 97 is the portion of the Commission's rules
that govern the Amateur Radio Service. In the
August 4 edition of the Federal Register, the FCC
issued a summary of the R&O entitled Amendment of
the Commission's Rules Regarding Amateur Radio
Service Communications During Government Disaster
Drills --noting that
<http://edocket.access.gpo.gov/2010/pdf/2010-19198.pdf>the
effective date of these new rules will be
September 3, 2010.<http://www.arrl.org/nladclick.php?n=al&t=i&i=2010-08-05&p=0>
+ It's a Bird, It's a Plane! No, It's an Asteroid
-- Asteroid (31531) ARRL, To Be Exact!
These three images were made on February 9, 1999
with the Spacewatch .9 meter telescope on Kitt
Peak (about 45 miles southwest of the city of
Tucson, at 6850 feet altitude). This main-belt
asteroid was discovered by software and confirmed
in the images by the observer on duty on that
date Jeffrey Larsen, PhD. The asteroid is moving
across the field of stars near the center, from
lower left to upper right. The images were taken
every 30 minutes in order to see how fast and in
what direction the asteroid was moving. Time
proceeds from left to right. [Observations of
Minor Planet (31531) ARRL by Prof Jeffrey A.
Larsen for the Spacewatch Project of the Lunar
and Planetary Laboratory, University of Arizona,
funded in 1999 by the National Aeronautics and
Space Administration, the US Air Force Office of
Scientific Research, the Steven and Michele
Kirsch Foundation and the David and Lucile
Packard Foundation. © 1999 by the Arizona Board
of Regents] Click
<http://www.arrl.org/images/view/News/31531%20ARRL_3.JPG>here
for a larger image.
John, Paul, George and Ringo are on the list.
Mozart, Bach, Beethoven and Brahms -- even Frank
Zappa and Elvis (but not Madonna). Of course
Asimov and Sagan made the cut, Mr Spock, too, but
not Captain Kirk. And now ARRL -- more precisely,
(31531) ARRL -- joins this prestigious company as
one of more than 16,000 named minor planets in
our solar system. A minor planet -- such as an
asteroid -- is an astronomical object in direct
orbit around the Sun that is neither a dominant
planet -- such as Mercury, Saturn and Neptune --
nor a comet. The first minor planet -- named
Ceres -- was discovered in 1801. Since then, more
than 200,000 minor planets have been discovered,
most of them lying in the asteroid belt. But as
of July 27, 2010, only 16,005 had been named.
Read more
<http://www.arrl.org/news/it-s-a-bird-it-s-a-plane-no-it-s-an-asteroid-asteroid-31531-arrl-to-be-exact>here.
+ ARRL Facebook Page Tops 10,500 Fans
With more than 10,500 fans on Facebook, the ARRL
page is the number one spot for hams on the
Internet's most popular social networking site.
Not only is the ARRL page the most popular
Amateur Radio page on Facebook, it is attracting
young -- and not-so-young -- hams to share their
opinions and ham radio-related news with other
hams. Read more
<http://www.arrl.org/news/arrl-facebook-page-tops-10-300-fans>here.<http://www.arrl.org/nladclick.php?n=al&t=i&i=2010-08-05&p=1>
+ Active Sun Puts on Display for Earth
The Sun, as seen on August 2, 2010, via NASA's
Solar Dynamics Observatory. View more SDO images
of the Sun at
<http://sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov/data>http://sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov/data.
[Image courtesy of NASA/SDO]
Last weekend was quite a busy time for our Sun.
During the late hours of Friday, July 30, a
magnificent coronal mass ejection (CME) billowed
away from the eastern limb of the Sun; the source
of the blast was apparently sunspot 1092. On
Sunday, August 1 at approximately 0855 UTC,
Earth-orbiting satellites detected a C3-class
solar flare, and again, the blast came from
sunspot 1092. At about the same time as the solar
flare, an enormous magnetic filament erupted,
stretching across the Sun's northern hemisphere,
a complex global eruption involving almost the
entire Earth-facing side of the Sun.
"This eruption is directed right at us and is
expected to get here early in the day on August
4,"
<http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/news/2010/pr201011.html>said
Leon Golub, Senior Astrophysicist with the Solar
and Stellar X-Ray Group in the High Energy
Astrophysics Division of the Harvard-Smithsonian
Center for Astrophysics. "It's the first major
Earth-directed eruption in quite some time. We
got a beautiful view of this eruption, and there
might be more beautiful views to come if it
triggers aurorae." Read more
<http://www.arrl.org/news/active-sun-puts-on-display-for-earth>here.
ARRL in Action: What Have We Been Up to Lately?
This feature -- including convenient Web links to
useful information -- is a concise monthly update
of some of the things that ARRL is doing on
behalf of its members. This installment covers
the month of July. Read more
<http://www.arrl.org/news/arrl-in-action-what-have-we-been-up-to-lately-24>here.<http://www.arrl.org/nladclick.php?n=al&t=i&i=2010-08-05&p=2>
+ Swiss Hams Set New World Record on 10 GHz
This map shows the path of the record-breaking
QSOs made by the Hyperatlantica 2010 Team. [Map
courtesy of of Michel Berger, HB9BOI]
A group of six Swiss hams have set a new record
for the longest contact (based on GPS
coordinates) made on 10 GHz using SSB -- 2696 km
(1675 miles): from
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sal,_Cape_Verde>Ilha
do Sal (one of the northern Cape Verde islands)
to Portugal. Using a 20 W transmitter -- with a
90 cm parabolic reflector with 35 dB gain --
these hams, part of the
<http://www.hyperatlantica.ch/>Hyperatlantica
2010 DXpedition, were able to contact Portugal on
the morning of July 10 for almost 25 minutes. The
original record of 2070 km (1286 miles) -- set in
2000 by Armin Martsch, DL4AM, and Adalbert
Kaufmann, DJ3KM -- was broken by the Swiss group
earlier that same day, with a contact between
Ilha do Sol and Tangier, Morocco at a distance of 2200 km (1367 miles).
+ Solar Update
The Sun, as seen on Thursday, August 5, 2010 from
<http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/realtime/realtime-update.html>NASA's
SOHO Extreme Ultraviolet Imaging Telescope. This
<http://soi.stanford.edu/>MDI (Michelson Doppler
Imager) image was taken in the continuum near the
Ni I 6768 Angstrom line. The most prominent
features are the sunspots. This is very much how
the Sun looks in the visible range of the spectrum.
Tad
"<http://www.dartmouth.edu/%7Emilton/reading_room/pl/book_3/index.shtml>There
lands the Fiend, a spot like which perhaps
Astronomer in the Sun's lucent Orbe through his
glaz'd Optic Tube yet never saw" Cook, K7RA,
reports: Both the sunspot numbers and solar flux
declined this week, with the average daily
sunspot numbers down more than 15 points to 20.3
and the average daily solar flux down nearly 4
points to 81.4. A new sunspot group emerged
Wednesday, and two more may be coming on
Thursday. Geomagnetic activity was high, due to a
coronal mass ejection that sent Wednesday's
planetary A index to 42; a second CME may hit
earth Thursday. The predicted planetary A index
for August 5-9 is 35, 15, 7, 5 and 5. Look for
more information -- including a look at the
three-month moving average of daily sunspot
numbers that rose more than four points to 20.4,
as well as the outlook for the near term -- on
the ARRL Web site on Friday, August 6. For more
information concerning radio propagation, visit
the
<http://www.arrl.org/propagation-of-rf-signals>ARRL
Technical Information Service Propagation page.
This week's "Tad Cookism" is brought to you by
John Milton's
<http://www.dartmouth.edu/%7Emilton/reading_room/pl/book_1/index.shtml>Paradise
Lost
(<http://www.dartmouth.edu/%7Emilton/reading_room/pl/book_3/index.shtml>Book
3, lines 588-590).
This Week on the Radio
This week:
* August 6 -- NCCC Sprint Ladder
* August 7 -- TARA Grid Dip Shindig
* August 7-8 --
<http://www.arrl.org/august-uhf>ARRL UHF Contest;
North American QSO Party (CW); 10-10 International Summer Contest (SSB)
* August 8 -- SKCC Weekend Sprint
* August 11 -- NAQCC Straight Key/Bug Sprint; QRP Fox Hunt
* August 11-12 -- CWops Mini-CWT Tests
Next week:
* August 13 -- NCCC Sprint Ladder
* August 14 -- Feld Hell Sprint
* August 14-15 -- Maryland-DC QSO Party; WAE DX Contest (CW)
* August 15 --
<http://www.arrl.org/rookie-roundup>ARRL Rookie Roundup (SSB)
* August 16 -- Run for the Bacon QRP Contest
* August 18 -- QRP Fox Hunt
All dates, unless otherwise stated, are UTC. See
the <http://www.arrl.org/contests>ARRL Contest
Branch page, the
<http://www.arrl.org/The-ARRL-Contest-Update>ARRL
Contest Update and the
<http://www.hornucopia.com/contestcal/index.html>WA7BNM
Contest Calendar for more info. Looking for a
Special Event station? Be sure to check out the
<http://www.arrl.org/special-events>ARRL Special
Events Station Web
page<http://www.arrl.org/nladclick.php?n=al&i=2010-08-05&t=r&p=0>.
----------
The ARRL Letter is published Thursdays, 50 times
each year. ARRL members and registered guests may
subscribe at no cost or unsubscribe by editing
their <http://www.arrl.org/Users/edit#!/edit-info-email_subscriptions>profile.
Copyright © 2010 American Radio Relay League, Inc. All Rights Reserved
More information about the CVRC
mailing list