Apparently the Irish authorities have agreed to allow Irish amateurs access to four 3kHz-wide frequencies in the 5MHz range - 5280, 5290, 5400 and 5405. Access is subject to individual application, and is not available to non-resident visitors operating under CEPT rules. Hopefully we’ll be hearing two of our regular chasers, EI2CL and EI7CC, on the band very soon. Enjoy!!
Excellent news. I’ve heard some blatant abuse on 5MHz from EI. Not by EI stations but by a G station on holiday in EI working back into G. He knew he was breaking the rules as did the extremely keen and active on 5MHz G station having a waffle with him.
You know there’s something fishy when the G on holiday gave his callsign as
"G4xxx portable in Ireland" rather than EI/G4xxx/P
This is really good news. It will be good to work Mike, Pete and others in the summer of 2008 when 3.MHz propagation is difficult during the day.
Do you know if non-residents can apply for an EI licence and NoV rather than operating under CEPT rules. I would quite like to go on another trip to EI next year and 5MHz would be really useful. I was really lucky with propagation to the UK on the last trip but it may not be so good next time.
In reply to GW4BVE:
As I understand it John it will only be available to resident amateurs and not available to visitors. It is by personal application so will,presumably, be similar to our NOV.
It appears from the ComReg site at http://www.comreg.ie/radio_spectrum/licence_types.541.874.rslicensing.html
that there is no requirement to be resident in Ireland to apply for a licence with an EI callsign. The form-filling looks rather tedious, and the cost is EUR12. Once you have the initial licence, you will have to apply for the 5MHz permit separately. Other “add-on” permits (30m, RTTY, 6m, 4m, etc) are currently issued free-of-charge, so I suspect this will be the same.
In reply to GW4BVE:
Good luck John - I’ve been searching for where I read that it would only be available for stations actually resident in EIRE rather than holders of EI callsigns,but can’t find it. I may have dreamed it of course