A friend to remember: Santi EA2BSB SK

(in english below)

Con gran tristeza lamento comunicar que este pasado 25 de agosto mi querido amigo Santi ha fallecido después de estar peleando con un cáncer desde 2018.

Fue curioso la manera en que le conocí. Santi fue uno de los primeros activadores SOTA en EA2/NV. En agosto de 2011 recibí un correo electrónico suyo en el que se presentaba. Había leído algo de mí a través del reflector y en seguida me localizo para escribirme.

En su carta me conto sus divertidas experiencias haciendo sus primeras activaciones de montes Sota y me consulto acerca de mi equipamiento, proponiéndome charlar e intercambiar ideas.


Santi aumentando la propagación / Santi enhancing propagation.

Dado que ambos vivíamos en la misma ciudad, en seguida nos conocimos. Fue el comienzo de una bonita amistad, en la que tuvimos ocasión de intercambiar ideas, experimentar haciendo antenas caseras, realizar activaciones juntos, alguna de ellas acompañados por nuestras esposas, y recibir buenos consejos por su dilatada experiencia como montañero.

En sus comienzos se dedico a la VHF, teniendo algunas dificultades para lograr 4 contactos desde algunas cimas, pero pronto empezó a combinarla con la HF.

Su interés le llevo a aprender morse y en sus últimas activaciones logro unos cuantos contactos en CW a baja velocidad. Le recuerdo esforzándose en decodificar en alguna de sus activaciones o contactando conmigo para cazarme con su manipulador.

Siempre recordare su carácter alegre, tranquilo y risueño, dispuesto a sacar una sonrisa en un momento de apuro. Nunca estuvo pendiente de los ranking y huía de la notoriedad, pese a que realizo muchas activaciones de cimas no activadas antes en Navarra.


Santi Shack Sloth

Su log de activador ha quedado detenido con 955 puntos. No pudo alcanzar los 1000 puntos, pero para mí siempre permanecerá en el recuerdo como el primer mountain goat de Navarra, y sobre todo, como un buen amigo con quien disfrutaba charlando de la vida cuando me acompañaba en el monte.

Santi, descansa en paz y disfruta de la belleza de las montanas desde las alturas. Un abrazo a tu querida familia, a Pilar, Santi y Javi, y a tus amigos.

73 de Ignacio

It is with great regret that I have to tell you that Santi passed away yesterday August 25th, after dealing with cancer since 2018.

It’s a funny story how I met him. Santi was one of the first SOTA activators here in EA2/NV. Back in August 2011 I got an email introduction from him. He rode something from me in the Sota reflector and decided to search my email address and contact me.

In his letter, he told me about his funny experiences while starting activating SOTA and requested some advice about gear, and proposed to interchange information.

Living in the same city allowed us to meet. That was the start of a nice friendhip, where we explored new ideas, built and tested together some hombrew antennas, did some joint activations, some together with our wives, and I got some good advices from him because of his deep mountain skills.

At first, he activated more often in VHF, experiencing difficulties to log 4 qso at times, but he soon started combining with HF.

His interest pushed him to learn morse code and in his last activations he grabbed a number of qso in CW QRS. I remember him devoting some effort to decode up in a summit or when chasing me from home with his key.

I will remember his cheerful personality, always calm and smiling, ready to face a difficulty with a joke. He was never waiting for ranking nor caring much for being on top of them, although he did lots of first time activation of new summits here in Navarre.

His activator log stuck on 955 points. He couldn’t reach the desired 1000 points, but as for me he will remain as the first Mountain goat in NV and more over, as a good friend with which I enjoyed chatting about life and family while hiking together.

Santi, rest in peace and enjoy the beauty of mountains from the heights.

My condolences to Santi’s family, Pilar, Santi and Javi, and friends.

73 Ignacio

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Sad to hear this news. RIP Santi.

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Ignacio un abrazo muy fuerte.

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Sorry to hear that Santi EA2BSB is now silent key. My thoughts are with his family.

Jimmy M0HGY

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Mucho animo Ignacio, pude hacer algun S2S con el y eso me llena de alegria dentro de la tristeza… …

Saludos Ec2ag

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Sorry to hear this. I have added the title SK to his reflector ID so that it will show next to his call sign on his previous posts.

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Vale Santi EA2BSB

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Santi Requiescat in pace

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Very sorry to hear this news. Condolences to his family and friends.

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Thank you, Ignacio for the nice comments you’ve posted about our friend Santi. I liked it very much, particularly for those beautiful photos of Santi in the places where he most liked being, in the mountains, with his smile and his expresion of a natural and happy man. Deep feelings while seeing them and reading your words and again right now while writing this.
>Gracias, Ignacio, por esta bonita reseña que has publicado sobre nuestro amigo Santi. Me ha gustado mucho, especialmente por esas fotos preciosas de Santi en los lugares donde más le gustaba estar, en las montañas, con su sonrisa y su expresión de hombre sencillo y feliz. Me emociono al verlas y al leer tus palabras y vuelvo a emocionarme ahora mismo mientras escribo esto.

Santi and I have been fighting against cancer at nearly the same time since 2018, but unfortunately, the outcome hasn’t been the same for us both. I’ve been in frequent contact with him all this time and although I was seeing he was having tremendous difficulties with the different treatments he had to undergo, I always kept the hope that he would finally suceed. Unfortunately, this hasn’t been the case and this makes me full of sadness. I had the hope that both of us would overcome cancer and would go to celebrate it to Mt. Adi EA2/NV-017 together with our common friend Ignacio EA2BD, as we did that day of my first SOTA activation in November 2013…
>Santi y yo hemos estado luchando contra el cáncer casi al mismo tiempo desde 2018, pero desgraciadamente, el resultado final no ha sido el mismo para los dos. He estado en contacto frecuente con él en todo este tiempo y aunque veía que estaba teniendo enormes dificultades con los diferentes tratamientos a los que se iba sometiendo, tuve siempre la esperanza de que al final iba a lograrlo. Desgraciadamente, no ha sido así y ello me llena de tristeza. Tenía la esperanza de que los dos pudieramos vencer al cáncer e ir a celebrarlo al Adi EA2/NV-017 junto con nuestro común amigo Ignacio EA2BD, como aquel día de mi primera activación en noviembre 2013…

It’s difficult for me to express with words the huge affection and deep estimate I felt for Santi. He was close to me in my very first steps as a SOTA activator, not only in my first activation of Adi EA2/NV-017 in November 2013, but also in various others shortly later, Eltxumendi EA2/NV-132, Etxauri EA2/NV-070, Esparatz EA2/NV-095, etc… In my initial trajectory as a SOTA activator, Santi was my true Sherpa and I want to make public my huge recognition and dedicate to him my personal Sherpa Award.
>Me resulta muy difícil expresar con palabras el enorme cariño y profundo aprecio que sentía por Santi. Él estuvo junto a mí en mis primerísimos pasos como activador SOTA, no solo en mi primera activación del Adi EA2/NV-017 en Noviembre de 2013, sino en varias otras poco después, Eltxumendi EA2/NV-132, Etxauri EA2/NV-070, Esparatz EA2/NV-095, etc… En mi trayecto inicial como activador SOTA, Santi fue mi verdadero Sherpa y quiero hacer público mi enorme agradecimiento y dedicarle mi personal Sherpa Award:


R.I.P. my friend Santi…
>D.E.P. mi amigo Santi…

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Sorry to hear Santi has gone especially so close to Goat.

73
Ron
VK3AFW

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So sorry to hear about the loss of Santi,worked him many times on his activation,
thank you for the information Ignacio.A very sad loss. Don G0RQL.

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Very sad to hear this news.about Santi. My condolences to his family and all his SOTA friends in EA2 and beyond.

Gerald G4OIG / G8CXK.

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Sad news indeed and he looked so young and healthy.

Happy trails, Santi.

Paul
W6PNG/M0SNA

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I don’t believe I ever contacted Santi but felt close to him after reading the very nice tribute, Ignacio. The last photo was particularly touching.

73, Walt

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Hola
Lo lamento Ignacio…!
Gomes 73

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Sad news Ignacio,
Got Santi in my log CW on 20m from summit.
May he can hear our sigs from the heaven and look after his friends and family.
RIP
73 Gerald

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It is very hard and very difficult to dismiss radio colleagues who have been wonderful people and Santi was one of those people that I always enjoyed in his company.

Santi and Ignacio EA2BD they have been the ones who taught me this fantastic SOTA world and those who encouraged me to work the activators.

With Santi and Ignacio I was able to go up to my first summit and do my first SOTA activity and here you can see the short video:

image

Santi, we will miss you very much and I will always remember you.

R.I.P.

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Bonita reseña Ignacio! No pude dejar de emocionarme con su lectura evocando los buenos momentos compartidos con el.
Gracias por esas imágenes para el recuerdo de nuestro común amigo Santi, con su mirada franca y espontáneo buen humor.
En mi caso, quiero añadir, que he sido un afortunado al contar con su amistad y poder compartir multitud de proyectos de muy diversa índole dentro la radio, comenzando, hacia finales de 2012 con la estación de Rebote Lunar, pasando por el montaje y reparación de antenas o el montaje de la red wifi, entre otros y últimamente implemento la recepción remota en la estación de concursos. A el le debo mis primeros pasos en “Linux” y “Arduino”, sin duda, sus recursos y conocimientos eran inagotables! Y como una imagen vale más que mil palabras….

Nice review Ignacio! Deep feelings while reading, evoking the good times shared with him.
Thank you for those images to remember our mutual friend Santi, with his frank gaze and spontaneous good humor.
In my case, I want to add, that I have been fortunate to have his friendship and to be able to share a multitude of projects of a very diverse nature within the radio, beginning, towards the end of 2012 with the EME station, passing through the placing and repair antennas or the assembly of the Wi-Fi network, among others and lately he have implemented remote reception in our contest station. I owe him my first steps in “Linux” and “Arduino”, without a doubt, his resources and knowledge were inexhaustible! And as a picture is worth a thousand words….


Trabajando juntos en la punta de la torre de 30 metros de altura en la reparacion de la Yagi de 40M en Junio de 2013
Working together on top of 30 meter high tower, repairing the 40M Yagi in June of the year 2013

Por fin, consiguió contagiarme su afición a las SOTA cuando a finales de 2013 empecé como cazador y luego en Julio de 2015 fue mi primera activación SOTA desde EA2/NV-108 Harriaundi contando con dos “padrinos” y maestros de excepción Ignacio EA2BD y Santi EA2BSB que fueron los verdaderos artífices de mi estreno.
Desde aquel día tuve el honor de acompañar a Santi en varias activaciones juntos y compartir su pasión por la montaña y profundo respeto por la naturaleza.
La siguiente imagen tiene un significado muy especial para mí ya que fue la última vez que activamos juntos en compañía de Ignacio EA2BD en Diciembre de 2017 desde EA2/NV-177 Larrazpil y con una bonita nevada.

Finally, he managed to infect me with his love to SOTA when at the end of 2013 I started as a hunter and then in July 2015 was my first SOTA activation from EA2 / NV-108 Harriaundi with two “godfathers” and exceptional teachers Ignacio EA2BD and Santi EA2BSB who were the true architects of my debut.
From that day on, I had the honor of accompanying Santi in various activations together and sharing his passion for the mountains and deep respect for nature.
The following image has a very special meaning for me since it was the last time we activated together in the company of Ignacio EA2BD in December 2017 from EA2 / NV-177 Larrazpil and with a nice snowfall.

Muchas gracias por brindarme tu amistad y conocimientos, espero que allí donde estés puedas seguir “enredando con tus juguetes” como tu decías……

Descansa en Paz amigo Santi

Thank you very much for giving me your friendship and knowledge, I hope that wherever you are, you can continue “messing with your toys” as you said …
Rest in Peace my friend Santi

73s Jorge
EA2LU

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Ah, what a wonderful story, with such a sad end. Sorry for the loss of your friend.

73
Gerald
MW0WML

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