SOTA Quarterly News May 2021

Welcome to the May 2021 Quarterly News. Covid-19 is still seriously impacting many Associations but here in the UK we have made amazing progress to normality as I believe has also the US, Australia, New Zealand and some eastern Asian countries. Anyone want to give a perspective on their country? I have had my second vaccination almost 3 weeks ago so I am supposed to have reached as much protection as I will get, fingers crossed. Contributions are rather thin on the ground for this quarter but many thanks to Barry GM4TOE, Andy MM0FMF, Ken G0FEX. Allan GW4VPX, Simon G7WKX, Etienne K7ATN, Elliot K6EL, Oleh KD7WPJ and Guru EA2IF for their contributions. Have I missed anyone? We will start with the latest awards status from Barry GM4TOE

SOTA Awards February to April 2021

This report covers award claims for the period February to April 2021

The effects of lockdown, and restriction in Activations, is very obvious in the claims received but there are some significant claims this quarter.

Congratulations to Martha W0ERI with 150k Chaser points, outstanding and consistent chasing on her part. Significantly we have several claims from fairly new Associations in Indonesia and Taiwan with the first Shack Sloth in Taiwan – BX8AAD.

Please ensure you order the correct Award, I am not psychic and my crystal ball is broken!! The Activator and Chaser Awards are based on POINTS accrued, the Activator and Chaser Unique Awards are based on the number of SUMMITS and the SOTA Complete Award requires you to have both Activated AND Chased each and every summit claimed. If in doubt please ask.

Congratulations to all who have reached their own significant milestone

Trophies Issued

Mountain Goat

KB1HQS Stuart Thomas

LA9XGA Tor-Atle Sandal

CT2HOV Nuno Gomes

HB9ELZ Markus Frauenknecht

JS1JNM Kensuke Orito

KM3A David Wise

Shack Sloth

6K5XZE ChulHwa Jung

JI1AVM Shinichi Kanamori

W7JKC John Calnan

LA9XGA Tor-Atle Sandal

HL5BMF Yonggyeom Kim

KF7WI Dwight Carlson

BX8AAD Gene Anderson

W6OBI David Fulmer

EA3Y Manel Lopez

Certificates Issued

Activator

KB1HQS Stuart Thomas 1000 points

IU1AUG Diego Chiari 1000 points

DL3TU Roman Brunel 1000 points

HB9ELZ Markus Frauenknecht 1000 points

JS1JNM Kensuke Orito 1000 points

VK1DA Andrew Davis 1000 points

KM3A David Wise 1000 points

JI1AVM Shinichi Kanamori 500 points

EA2EHX Bidal Iriate 500 points

JR8MHA Katsuyoshi Aoki 500 points

HL5BMF Yonggyeom Kim 250 points

TI2YO Minor Barrantes 100 points

KE4EA David Ivey 100 points

HB9HCS Stefan Kirchofer 100 points

IV3GVY Maurizio Dose 100 points

YD3AJO Agus Wahyuono 100 points

KF6FLJ Vincent LeVeque 100 points

Chaser

W0ERI Martha Auchard 150k points

EA5K Miguel Campos 20000 points

G0FVH David Dolling 15000 points

K7VK Vick Applegate 10000 points

KF7SEY Troy Greenburg 1000 points

KE4EA David Ivey 1000 points

ZL3QR Geoff Gillman 1000 points

JI1AVM Shinichi Kanamori 1000 points

W7JKC John Calnan 1000 points

W4NLT Andy Kubishen 1000 points

DL8NDG Axel Bienefeld 1000 points

EA4EMC Miguel-Angel Fernandez Garcia 1000 points

HL5BMF Yonggyeom Kim 1000 points

KB7JJG John Gesell 1000 points

KF7WI Dwight Carlson 1000 points

HB9ELZ Markus Frauenknecht 1000 points

SP9MTJ Michal Janecki 1000 points

EA4EMC Miguel-Angel Fernandez Garcia 500 points

G7WKX Simon Davis-Crane 500 points

K6MAA Aleksandr Muravev 250 points

KB9JMU James Adams 250 points

G4TPJ Richard Mepham 100 points

YC1ME Mawan Darmawan 100 points

YC1RIK Wandi Riswandi 100 points

XE1ELI Ricardo Andrade 100 points

YD3AJO Agus Wahyuono 100 points

YF3CLS Mujianto 100 points

Activator Unique

HB9ELZ Markus Frauenknecht 100 summits

VK1DA Andrew Davis 100 summits

Chaser Unique

KD8DEU Allan J Van Brocklin 1000 summits

HL5BMF Yonggyeom Kim 100 summits

HB9ELZ Markus Frauenknecht 100 summits

Summit to Summit

VK1DA Andrew Davis Platinum

HB9IIO Daniel Mottier Platinum

DL1CR Christopher Muenzer Platinum

DL3TU Roman Brunel Gold

DL6GCA Armin Kreutner Gold

HB9ELZ Markus Frauenknecht Silver

JR8MHA Katsuyoshi Aoki Bronze

SP9MTJ Michal Jarecki Red

Mountain Hunter

DL2YBG Klaus-Peter Dreessen Platinum

KF6HI Brian Hamerski Platinum

K6MAA Aleksandr Muravev Bronze

YC2VOC Galih Suryananto Bronze

YC1ME Mawan Darmawan Bronze

YC1RIK Wandi Riswandi Bronze

HB9LEK Martin Neukomm Bronze

I am hoping to re-stock Polo Shirts and Sweatshirts carrying a revised version of the SOTA logo, similar to the one on our hats, these will be available in limited colours and sizes until I establish potential demand.

Paypal have, yet again, changed their method of communicating to merchant websites which means that sometime you will receive confirmation of Paypal payment but no confirmation of the receipt of your order. I generally manage to logon to the shopping site to ensure these orders are correctly registered but would appreciate a “heads-up” from you if you have not received this confirmation. Hopefully this will be sorted soon.

If you order certificates to be sent to you by email please ensure you use an email address which accepts incoming mail from the shopping site email provider. Gmail works but many personal email service providers block the emails. Similarly this can happen with the confirmation of the placement of your order. If I spot it I will let you know (by PM via the Reflector).

That is it for this quarter – stay safe on the hills and keep away from anybody carrying that infernal virus

73

Barry GM4TOE

SOTA Awards Manager


From Andy MM0FMF.

News for Scotland

The lockdown restrictions have been easing over the month of April enabling much greater scope for activations. Before then there were a few lucky people who had SOTA summits within the vaguely described government limits who activated, but now travel anywhere in mainland Scotland is OK there are plenty of people getting out. By the time you read this the limit on staying away overnight should have been lifted and Jack GM4COX has plans to activate a number of infrequently activated Argyll summits.

A group of (relatively) new SOTA activators are now out regularly including MM0ZFG, MM0EFI and GM4JXP. Gavin GM0GAV has been out making use of a new off road bike to activate some properly remote summits.

Finally I expect to submit some GM summit changes. The have been lurking for years due to the generally low number of activators and activations happening but as there has been some noticeable growth then it’s time to get the changes in place. Expect to see the details published in May and the actual summit deletions to happen by the end of September/October 2021.

Andy MM0FMF
GM Association Manager


From Elliott K6EL

“Hold that date”… October 16, 2021 is our ninth annual free SOTA lunch at ARRL Pacificon in the Marriott Hotel, San Ramon, California, hosted by K6EL. Details to follow in August.
Thanks,
Elliott


From Oleh KD7WPJ

SOTA give an opportunity to work with very low power stations.

In March during activations of North Chalone (W6/SC-149) and South Chalone (W6/SC-153) Peaks I made contacts with QRPP station NR0R. His power is only 100 mW (!). The distance is approximately 2347 km (1467 miles).

73! Oleh


From Simon G7WKX

Just a quick note for the news. I completed my first SSTV chase on 10th April, when I worked Tom M1EYP/P on his summit G/SP-013. I’ve attached a couple of pictures. My next target is an SSTV activation and ideally an SSTV S2S!

Images: Capture 1 Capture 2

Simon


From Ken G0FEX.

HB15SOTA
What a brilliant event, organised by the Swiss Sota Team, I have and still am enjoying this event.
It has been quite challenging at times with the conditions on the bands, but we all struggle on and try to make the contacts.
There is still a few days to go before it ends, but I as many others have really enjoyed the chase, it is not about who gets there first, but all about the taking part.
So from myself and I am sure I speak for many others, a big thank you to all HB15SOTA organisers and activators, very well done, it has been a pleasure to participate.
Thank you all : Ken G0FEX

ISLAND ACTIVATION - Shetland Isles
On the 1st of May 4 members from the Humber DX Amateur Radio Club will be travelling to the Isle of UNST they will be based in Norwick, and I understand they will be activating various summits on the Island they will be using GB0SI as their call, this will take place from the 1st of May until the 8th.
As you can appreciate the dates may vary due to ferry times etc.
Ken


From Allan GW4WPX

Radio Tales from Wales by Allan GW4VPX

As Wales eased out of lockdown many within the country including myself made tentative steps up on to local summits and it was so nice to hear the voices of regular chasers and to get the occasional Summit to Summit with fellow Welsh activators. The real difference took place when the border restrictions between England and Wales were eased then a flurry of activations took place and I noted that it was reminiscent of the ‘good old days’ with summit to summit contacts coming thick and fast and I’m happy to say it is still ongoing.

The new Facebook group entitled GW SOTA (Summits on the Air ) has really taken off and it’s good to see so many in the group taking an active part in uploading all sorts of interesting information and activation reports of their exploits on the mountains in Wales after lockdown. If you regularly operate SOTA on the mountains in Wales then please do join the group and share your experiences. You can also tap into the activation experiences of members that have been in SOTA for a long time and know the best and appropriate routes to the summits in Wales.

I’m keeping an eye on the SOTA database as there are a few who are working hard on the mountains of Wales to try and attain Mountain Goat in the not too distant future. Ian 2W0IWM managed 500 activation points a few weeks ago so well done Ian and we look forward to seeing you progress to Mountain Goat.

image

Ian 2W0IWM on Fan Fawr GW/SW-005

All - Please send me a brief report and especially some pictures of your activation so that I can include them here.

Useful Blogs and SOTA Mapping (most of these are now up to date)

If you are intending to visit Wales to activate a summit the following blogs contain valuable information.

Information on routes to our summits in Wales are also on SOTA Mapping https://www.sotamaps.org and is an useful and essential first port of call.

Simon G4TJC continues to find new routes in North Wales with historical links and they can be found on his blog http://g4tjc.blogspot.com/

Allan GW4VPX continues to add reports and routes to ‘Radio Tales from West Wales and beyond…’ [https://gw4vpx.blogspot.com/ ]

Phil G4OBK … a wealth of information http://catterblog.blogspot.com/

Tom M1EYP …summit info as well as useful advice on places to stay and eat [http://tomread.co.uk/] (click on his link to SOTA on his website).

Andrew M1CJE http://blog.m1cje.uk/ well worth a visit with interesting presentations and information linked to summits in Wales

Paul M0PLA http://m0pla.blogspot.com/ well worth a visit with interesting presentations and information linked to summits in Wales

Facebook:- GW SOTA (Summits on the Air)

73 and Stay Safe …. Allan GW4VPX


From Etienne K7ATN

On 17th April we had unexpectedly beautiful weather for a “Willamette Valley Summit-to-Summit Party.” We had 31 Activators on 22 summits making hundreds of contacts over about an hour and a half to work most all of the permutations. Tim-N7KOM posted a trip report and he looks quite relaxed on the fire lookout catwalk:
Devils Peak 2021 WV S2S Party Snowshoe | pnwsota.org.

From Outside Magazine: Inside the Summit-Obsessed World of Ham Radio – “It’s like biathlon, but for geeks” https://www.outsideonline.com/2421479/ham-radiohobby-summit.
See the photo on the last page with the “Very Difficult Trail” warning.

All of the PNW newsletter can read at http://www.pnwsota.org/sites/pnwsota.org/files/downloads/K7ATN/PNW%20SOTA%20Newsletter%20Apr-May-Jun%202021.pdf


Final Comment

Well that is all for this quarter unless I have missed something of which someone will remind me. A little bit thin this quarter so I would like to encourage Association Managers to consider submitting a brief report from their association to share with the rest of community even if only a line or two.

Some of you may have noticed that the report of activity in Spanish speaking associations that has previously been a regular feature has been missing recently. As Guru EA2IF tells us, SOTA software changes have meant that a new process needs to be developed to produce the data that Guru requires. Andy MM0FMF is very busy with current work but is looking to find time this year to set up a data provision.

Change your Call Sign - Do not register your new call sign. Post to the reflector and we will update your current ID. Why should I not just delete my existing account and register again? Well firstly If you have ever posted you will most likely find that you cannot as we have set some parameters because posts in this Discourse software are directly linked to your userid/callsign and if your account is deleted these dissappear leaving holes in any topics to which you contributed… Next your account contains an invisible record of what you have ever read and where you are in any topic or thread. (we cannot see that) so with a new registration, that would be lost and you would be back at square one, having to wind your way through every topic to re-establish where you are up to. If we change your call sign all your current posts and reading lists are retained with your new call sign.

Till next quarter stay safe. I hope that we can all return to nearer the normality that we had before this pandemic.
73 Jim G0CQK

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" Welcome to the May 2021 Quarterly News. Covid-19 is still seriously impacting many Associations but here in the UK we have made amazing progress to normality as I believe has also the US, Australia, New Zealand and some eastern Asian countries. Anyone want to give a perspective on their country"

Hi Jim

ZL was in various forms of lockdown which prevented anyone activating from 23 March 2020 to 13 May 2020. Since then apart from two short lockdowns in Auckland (ZL1), there have been no restrictions on activating.

73
Mark ZL3AB

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FB! Is there a reference somewhere that tells what the S2S awards are in numbers rather than “red, bronze, etc?”

Yes, the colours/points are explained in the S2S Award section on the SOTA shop.

Why do summits get deleted?

The points to color isn’t explicitly mapped out, but looking at this page this is the likely pairing:

Red 250
Bronze 500
Silver 1000
Gold 2500
Platinum 5000

Can’t wait to get to red!

The basics are explained in the text describing the awards and the full details are on the drop down when you order an award.

Capture

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Because they no longer qualify. Typically another summit is found to be more prominent or re-measurement shows the summit to be less prominent.

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Aha!

Although some SOTA summits in GM no longer have the 150m prominence to qualify as SOTA summits, I am aware also that some new hills in GM have been found to now have 150m prominence so I expect that these will become SOTA summits.

Jimmy M0HGY

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Thats cool, but surprises me, as I thought that everything would have been surveyed with accurate gps by now, although as I type this I do recall some chaps trying to get an extra Munro or Top out of Ben Avon a couple of years ago. They didn’t succeed.

No. The vast majority was surveyed with levels and theodolites by the 60s. The OS gave up using all trig points many years back and now just use a small subset of them along with many other GPS benchmarks. So yes they have an updated model and are always checking and improving accuracy. They don’t have a good business reason to remeasure Munros etc. to ensure they are accurate to 1cm.

Most of the changes in the UK are the result of a bunch of guys in the RHB (Relative Hills of Britain) group known as The Tamperers. The have survey grade GPS gear and produce results of such accuracy that the OS will update map data from their submissions. For them, prominence is important and they have been measuring summits where the P value is 140-160m as these are most likely when resurveyed to result in additions/deletions from the lists. Likewise checking with double summits which is the higher etc.

Some of the changes coming up in GM are the result of accurate surveying and finding one summit is actually 20cms lower than believed resulting the true summit moving about 500m to the other summit. For some the P value has been measured as only being 149.4m i.e. 60cm too small and so the summit is deleted.

The errors are small, most under 50cms, that the urgency to update the association is not justified especially as I do other SOTA jobs. But they’ve been festering for a while now so it’s time to get them done.

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That’s the guys i was thinking of.

Thanks for the detailed explanation.:+1:

|nteresting. `My wife thinks SOTA is a bit nerdy. Wait till I tell her about the RHB group.

But on a practical level I notice they are capable of measuring with such accuracy (you mention 60cm for example), I wonder how, they deal with cairns, rocks or archeological tumuli given that they can significantly alter whether a particular prominence is either included or excluded?
David

To a few cms in fact. It’s worth checking out their Groups.io pages and see how the do things. I thought I was a pedant as are many on here but some of the RHB take pedantry to new heights (no pun intended) and you have to admire that :slight_smile:

They have just remeasured The Coyles Of Muick GM/ES-050 to be 599.2m from the OS stated height of 601m (OS 1:50k) or 596m (OS 1:25k). I think that that height is accurate to 10cms.

I can recommend Coyles Of Muick as a cracking little summit.

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You can also wave at Chas & Camilla on the way up there :crazy_face:

Ah yes, Fred & Gladys. But you wont catch a glimpse of Haz & Megs any more.

I did GM/ES-050 the year before last. Lovely summit and excellent view. Even the walk up was interesting.

Not if you’re going to delete it! :wink:

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As far as I am aware, this list below are the changes that I am aware of in GM and this mentioned summit isn’t going to be one of the ones to be deleted.

Carn Liath GM/ES-020 is replaced by Creag an Dail Bheag (new GM/ES Marilyn).

Beinn Dearg GM/SS-067 is replaced by Creag na h-Eararuidh (new GM/SS Marilyn).

GM/WS-053 - summit relocation from Maoile Lunndaidh to Creag Toll a’Choin. No deletion or addition required as col between both these summits are within activation zone. I think there similar SOTA summits in GM where the summit location has changed, but SOTA reference number can stay the same due to old and new summit locations being within activation zone of each other.

Creag an Amalaidh - new Marilyn in GM/NS.

Cruim Leacainn GM/WS-344 - no longer a Marilyn.

Troweir Hill GM/SS-257

Sithean Mor - New Marilyn in GM/WS,

Kirriereoch Hill - New Marilyn in GM/SS.

Stob na Boine Druim-fhinn G/SS-089

Beinn Dearg - new Marilyn in GM/NS

White Hill is now twinned with Hightown Hill GM/SS-273 and according to Hill-Bagging White Hill is now the Marilyn and Hightown Hill GM/SS-273 is the twin Hightown Hill (hill-bagging.co.uk) White Hill (hill-bagging.co.uk). I think from this Hightown Hill GM/SS-273 would need to be deleted and White Hill becomes a new SOTA summit in GM/SS.

I also know that although this isn’t affected as such in terms of a SOTA point of view, but Cnoc Coinnich GM/SS-046 has increased in height and become a Corbett, see GM Marilyn is now a Corbett - Summit Info - SOTA Reflector. I am sure that heights have changed for plenty of other GM SOTA summits also due to more accurate surveying in recent years.

I am sure that the GM - Association Manager Andy MM0FMF will point out any changes that I’m not aware of when he announces the changes officially.

Jimmy M0HGY

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