FIELD DAY 2008 IS NOW
PAST, BUT HERE ARE A FEW PHOTOS
This year it was decided to hold our Field Day at the Wal-Mart
parking lot.
Many thanks to Wal-Mart and especially CURT and his
staff out on the pavement.
Click on a photo below to view a larger image.
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If
you have any photos of Field Day you would like to share
send them
to: webmaster@w7eca.org
WHY FIELD DAY
?
Earthquakes, tornadoes,
or other disastrous events may disable normal
communications. Usually within hours after such devastation,
local "HAM" radio operators have emergency stations on the air -
reporting on the conditions of the scene, and relaying vital life-saving
messages into and out of the affected area. In addition to
"official communications," HAMS also work closely with federal,
state, or local agencies to provide worried families outside the area
with health, welfare, and location information of loved
ones. In some cases, the only means of contact with the
affected area is amateur radio. Field Day gives Amateur Radio
Operators a chance to practice these skills.
CLICK HERE FOR OUR FIELD DAY NEWSLETTER
ARTICLE
The Southwest
Corner of the Wal-Mart Lot
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Attaching the Beams to the Mast / Rotator
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Beams on mast, mast on rotator, rotator on
tower,
tower on man-lift, and up up and away we go. |
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Jim - N7YO on Man-Lift / Tower |
George - AA7GS Operates while Bob - W7ETP
Logs
contacts at the SSB Station. |
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a
Norma - KE7FKY "mans" the Literature Table |
A meeting of the "B"s
Cameron - N7NBB and Bob -
W7NBB
enjoy some time visiting.
BOB was the Founding
President
Of the Great Falls Area Amateur Radio
Club
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Note the square antenna at the top of the
picture.
Our logging computers were not only networked,
but
also connected to the "outside world" via wireless
broadband. Thanks to
MPIWIFI
(aka Konceptio Data Services)
For
the Broadband
Connection |
Early Sunday morning at the phone station
N7NBB -
Cam works a mini pileup on 40m
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Your Field Day Photos are
welcome here.
Contact the Webmaster or send
to:
webmaster@w7eca.org |
REQUEST...
If anyone has any photos of
the
CW station in operation, I'd like
to post your photos
here.
Contact: Webmaster |
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AA7GS- George takes the first shift at the
20m phone station |
W7ETP - Bob helps George with Logging
the 20m
Phone contacts
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Jim - N7YO bundling the cables...
"Neatness
Counts" |
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Well, Field Day was a success here in town.
Normally our Field Day is held up at Kings Hill Campground, but this year it
was decided to give somewhere "closer in" a try. Permission was secured
to use the Southwest corner of the Wal-Mart parking lot, displacing a few of
the free campers for the weekend. Thursday afternoon, the Wal-Mart
parking lot guys barricaded an ample area in the corner of their lot with
shopping carts. Many thanks to Curt and his crew at Wal-Mart for
the fine job. Late Friday afternoon, some of the equipment
started to arrive... the tower trailer, the Man-Lift, etc. and yellow barrier
tape augmented the shopping cart perimeter. Later that evening
preliminary work of assembling the beams, stringing coax and other
cabling was underway. Midway through the 'ground work',
the crew was treated to PIZZA, thanks to the club.
Saturday Morning dawned, the final construction and
setup of the Field Day site commenced. When the generators spun up
and the first RF blazed forth from the beams at Noon, the only things
left to do were "cosmetic" (taping of cables, setting up the Literature Table,
making sure the coffee pot was refreshed, etc)
This year we had a very strong presence at the CW
station, thanks to Eric - K7ABV and Ray - KE7KZT. The Phone station also
was almost continually manned, and at times the pileups on 20 meters were
almost overwhelming. CQ CQ Field day was heard on both the CW and Phone
stations until well into the wee hours of the morning. At that point,
according to George - AA7GS most all the contacts we were making turned
out to be duplicates. Operations were suspended around 3:00am, and some
well deserved rest ensued. By 6am the next morning the stations were
once again active, thanks to Jim - KE7BIN and CAM -
N7NBB.
The final tally has not yet been verified but at this
writing, it seems GFAARC wound up with well over 1000 points in contacts
alone. This does not include the additional bonus points or
multipliers. This well exceeds the normal score for the past few
years. Thanks to MPIWIFI and Konceptio Data Services for the
Wireless Broadband Internet connection, and to Jim - N7YO for the
wireless router and networking the computers used for logging and other
lookup functions.
Of special note, our site was visited by longtime
ham Bob Lydiard - W7NBB, the Founding President of our organization. Bob
spent quite a while reminiscing with old friends of the hobby, and
meeting new friends.
