I’m hoping to get out to a total of six local (easy) summits on Monday as it’s a new year and these summits still have a winter bonus for the activator on them.
These will (hopefully) be quick activations, so that I have time to get all of the summits in. So my apologies if you come 10 minutes after my self-spot and I’m no longer there.
This WILL depend upon the weather however my hope is to activate the following summits on 40m SSB:
(possibly in a different sequence depending upon the roads):
Update 4/2/2018 - we have had snow overnight and I know that one summit will now be difficult to make a timely ascent to in snow/mud, so I have dropped that one. If the snow starts again during today (Sunday) I may have to consider rescheduling the exercise, however more snow is forecast from mid-week. To add to my problems, I think I have caught the flu bug that is going around, we’ll see what tomorrow brings!
Editted to correct times: 13h45 and 14h10 instead of previous wrong 12h45 and 13h10.
Hi Ed,
None of them in my case, I’m afraid, unless you are on air from some of those summits between 13h45 and 14h10 utc and propagation conditions are good between us on 40m, which is highly unlikely…
For the rest of the time, I’ll be at work…
I wish you good luck!
73,
I can’t say for definate that I’ll be on between 12:45 and 13:10 (local time I presume, not UTC?) as it’ll depend how long I have taken on the earlier summits. 40m DL-EA around lunchtime is “possible”. If I am on a summit at the time, I’ll especially listen for you.
Mind you, it’s just started snowing again here, so we’ll need to see what the weather is like on Monday in any case.
Hi Ed,
I had wrongly expressed the utc times in my post as we were in summer (i.e. UTC = EA+2) but we are not, obviously ;-). Now it’s UTC = EA+1. I have corrected now my previous post.
My lunch time break allows me to have a quick look to SOTAwatch and trying to work some possible activations between 13h45 and 14h10 UTC.
I’ll look for you,
We had snow here last night and it’s been raining all the day today. All the mountains around were well covered in snow when I got up this morning.
The rain must have melted some of the snow on Mt. San Cristóbal, as it was much whiter earlier. This is how it looks like right now. Very wet…
Thanks to all chasers who called me today - I’ll be posting a report on my blog at dd5lp.com in a couple of days.
Congratulations to Pedro @EA2CKX who managed to work me on all of the 5 summits!
What’s the prize? Nothing apart from bragging rights I’m afraid.
I really appreciate that chasers tried to catch me on as many summits as possible as well as Pedro’s herculian effort, other chasers of note who managed to catch me on three of the five summits were:
OM1AX, OZ7JZ, SP9AMH and G4WSB.
Special thanks also go out to the German and Swiss chasers who as well as having to deal with my weak signal were also fighting against the extended skip distance and I could hear them coming up and down as conditions changed. I suspect some of these must have been ground wave contacts.
Thanks to all - it’s really nice to hear the regular chasers and some new ones when out activating. This is a nice community to be a member of and I really appreciate the honour of being part of SOTA.
Reminds me of an attempt to activate 24 summits in 24 hours by a UK team. In that case their meticulous planning did not extend to remembering to fill the car up with fuel causing the team an embarrassing fail.
I’ve already managed 7 in a day (but in warmer weather) and if I’m not mistaken, Phil G4OBK on holiday came and added another one to my list to make it 8 in a day for him.
My “day” this time, stopped at 2pm so more would have been possible but I was feeling the cold by then.
73 Ed.
24 summits in 24 hours even with multiple operators is one heck of a challenge (especially if you forget to fill up the petrol in the car HI)!
It was a shame because they did intend to try to raise some money for a charity and of course nothing was rasied as the event never ran.
But it was ever so funny at the time. Especially considering several of those involved spent a large proportion of their time telling the MT of the day how they , the MT were wrong and running SOTA all wrong.
Just as well the MT of the day ignored them or SOTA too may have run “out of fuel” instead of expaning over the last 10 years to 139 associations and 125k summits; the sun never sets on SOTA nowadays!
I’d almost forgotten about it but looking back, it’s just as funny today as it was then. What’s that expression about organising a drinking session at a brewery?
Anyway, their incompetance should not distract from your success, well done Ed.
Well done in OK Victor.
Hmm, raising the bar even further! I think with my knowledge now of how to best access a lot of local summits, some good weather and an activating partner (to help with putting up and taking down equipment - antennas etc. Oh yes and to go and buy the biers), 10 summits in a day in just the DL/AM & AL regions should be possible. Maybe even more …
This is starting to sound a little like RADAR type activations (quick set-up and take down). I susoect more will depend upon traffic on the roads between the summits as access to the summits themselves.
The highest record of summits activated in a day was when both Myke G6DDQ and James M0ZZO logged 24 activation in 1 day back in 2007. These were in 24 SOTA summits in G/WB, one of these summits since Black Mountain changed SOTA reference from G/WB-001 to GW/SW-041 when the true summit was surveyed to actually be in Wales and not England.
With two (or more) people you can execute activations better. I normally activate alone.
In the case of the 2007 feat, did every summit score? i.e. were at least 4 contacts made on each summit, or only one? An activation only needs one contact to be valid. So two people could travel to 24 summits, one stay at the car, outside of the Activation zone and work the activator with a 2m HT at the summit and it’s activated. No need to carry up to the summit a big rig, battery, mast, wire antenna etc. as needed for HF.
I think I’ll stick to HF and 4 contacts on each summit. I’ll be happy to get 10 summits in a day, more than that for a lone activator will be difficult I think.
This was separate to the group who ran out if petrol. If you want to know about the contacts Myke G6DDQ and James M0ZZO made on the 24 activations, please have a look at their activation logs.
