It’s been a wild week in amateur radio, with many solar flares and geomagnetic disturbances sending the northern lights as far south as Arkansas.  We also have at least one unusual contest going on: the Worked All Europe DX Context, sponsored by that other DARC in Germany. The Route 66 special event is going on now, too!

We’ve got several club events coming up, with a radio day in the park planned for the Sept. 17th, our Lifewalk support taking place on October 1st, and a Lecture and Lab taking place on Sept. 23rd. Don’t forget that raffle tickets for the excellent Yaesu FT-991A are available at all our club events, including Lecture and Lab.

In the world of science and technology:

The Voynich Manuscript is a famous cryptographic puzzle, a book that no one can decode…maybe. A decoding claim has been made, but it’s not the first and might not be the last.

If you’re an adult who has things like a “date of birth” or a “Social Security Number,” you might not be happy…just about all of them have been leaked in a hack of credit reporting agency Equifax. Unlike past account number or password leaks, this is all data that has permanent value.

Thanks to online flight-tracking resources, you can watch private jets flee Hurricane Irma. We don’t have hurricanes here, but you might want to read about backing up your router and cable/DSL modem during a disaster. This actually did help Erin and I cope with the December 2013 power outage.

Thanks to DNA testing, evidence for female viking warriors is growing stronger!

And finally, don’t forget to say goodbye to Cassini! It’s been a smashing success, and its demise will take place in just less than a week.