[Elecraft] OT - Cruise Operation

[Bob McGraw K4TAX]

My son, KD4ODR, and myself, K4TAX and our wives on a Royal Caribbean 
cruise many years ago had the opportunity to visit the Radio Room of the 
ship.   I was amazed at the "antique" equipment still in place.   The 
Chief Radio Officer, in addition to the officer on duty, did indicate it 
wasn't used for much of anything, although the automatic SOS system was 
still functional.  At this time they were copying traffic for various 
ships and all was in CW running in the background.   He was surprised 
that I was able to follow along with many of the messages for other 
ships.  He indicated they monitored the channel 24/7 and could easily 
pick out their ships call as it appeared in a string of calls when 
traffic existed for their ship.

I presume since that time all of this has gone away in view of satellite 
communications and such.

73

Bob, K4TAX


On 9/25/2017 11:16 AM, Terry Schieler wrote:
> My last cruise on Royal Caribbean was, I believe, Sovereign of the Seas (?).  I had no plans to actually operate on the ship, but I met the Captain during the opening night reception and we had a chat.  Upon finding out my interest in amateur radio, the Captain said "hey, you'd like to meet "Per", our Chief Radio Officer (also a ham).  We had a nice visit.  The next day a courier appeared at my stateroom door with a message from the Chief Radio Officer offering me a personal tour of the ship's radio room.  I was let up to the bridge by a steward and Per, the Radio Officer took me into the radio room where there walls full of older HF gear which he quickly told me they don't use much anymore (mostly VHF and satellites now).  He let me sit at the gear and tune around.  I got some nice photos too.  Huge signals from everywhere and lots of fun.
>
> Never hurts to ask, even if you've brought no gear.  Per and I carried on an email exchange for a few months after that.
>
> 73, Terry, W0FM
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Wes Stewart [mailto:wes_n7ws at triconet.org]
> Sent: Friday, September 22, 2017 11:25 PM
> To: elecraft at mailman.qth.net
> Subject: Re: [Elecraft] Cruise Operation
>
> Contact XE1C
>
> He operates (as an officer) from Harmony of the Seas, interestingly enough a RC liner.
>
> Wes  N7WS
>
> On 9/22/2017 6:13 PM, Bob Witmer wrote:
>> Avoid Royal Caribbean ... “HAM RADIOS” are on the list of prohibited items along with firearms.
>>
>> No one at RCP seems to know why.  Even asked the captain - Said he doesn’t know about ham radio ...
>>
>> Would be interested to hear about cruise lines that are Ham Radio
>> friendly
>>
>> 73
>>
>> Bob W3RW
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