Ah - sorry wrong activation! I know there was one with the first 4 being VK and I know it was soon after I returned to Germany, before all the gear came over, so it would have only have been with the 817 barefoot - mind you, back then conditions were a LOT better.
73 Ed.
Ah here we go it was Irschenhausen - strange that’s a wooded summit, I’m surprised I got out so well! First FIVE were VK with two S2S contacts then the 6th. contact was from the states! With a futher three VK contacts (one of those an S2S) later in the list. Great days …
You have underplayed this Mike. I think your move slightly south this time was a good choice - not just luck. Activators further north struggled to work anyone at all.
I’d say his punctuality was they key, rather than the location. The early bird catches the worm, as they say. I was 20 minutes late - and caught a cold.
Hi Richard,
That text was actually from my reply, not Mike’s (Longest Distance to Qualify a Summit - #12 by VK6NU) but I still think luck is involved. I was a LOT further South than Mike and it didn’t help me!
In my case Tom may have the right answer - had I been operational 30 minutes earlier …
Well as the Aussies say “Wudda shudda cudda”. Next time I’ll start earlier!
In November 2014, John @VK6NU was activating Mt. Dale VK6/SW-036 and he had a SSB QSO with me on 20m and 10m while I was in my QTH Loc IN92CQ. I calculate the Long Path distance as roughly 25500 Km.
My contact yesterday with John ZL1BYZ, when I was activating Mt. Etxauri EA2/NV-070 (Locator. IN92BT) gives me, without knowing the exact location of his QTH and estimating it as in Locator RF72LW, a distance via Short Path of 19347 Km.
Using lat/long info from the summit data page, and John’s QRZ page, suggests a short path of 19330km, not much different to your estimate. It still looks like ZL3CC - F5RAG @ 19470km is the all-time DX SOTA QSO - unless anyone can come up with a better one.
Madrid / Auckland is a well-known antipodean pair, so the record might well come from an activation in central Spain - especially if John ZL1BYZ is in the log!
When I was living in Madrid, I got John ZL1BYZ several times in my log on 12, 15, 17 and 30m, but I wasn’t activating SOTA at that time. It was 2009 and 2010.
I can’t understand, Tom, why a French location gives you a longer Short Path distance to ZL than a location in Spain, as France is North-East of EA and the Short Path is towards the North-East of us here in EU.
We have a new leader - and somewhat remarkably, this contact took place TODAY! At 0849z this morning, ZL1BYZ worked EA5FV/P who was activating EA5/MU-042. A short path distance of 19740km.
This record can easily be broken though. The antipode of John’s QTH is in-between Seville and Malaga in the EA7 SOTA region. Therefore if you worked John from EA7/SE-007, that would be a short path distance of 20010km!
Guru @EA2IF - I guess it depends which part of ZL?
I don’t think so. Any place in the entire ZL territory will always be more distant to any place in the EA territory than any place in the F territory, just because the Short Path line is towards the North-East and we are at the South-West of France.
Can’t really say I set any great distance records on the 10th, my furthest being with 2E0YYY at 16,967KM’S.
Was very pleased with a S2S with Henning LM10SOTA in Norway which I have only worked once or twice before let alone on SOTA summit.
These far northern countries are bit hard to catch from VK.
Really a great event and looking forward to the next one.
The antipodal projection of the southern two thirds (or so) of South Island New Zealand lies in the Bay of Biscay, so parts of it may be nearer western France than southern Spain. There will, of course, be parts of Spain that are closer, but were there any SOTA contacts from those parts…
