Tech Net News 03-23-2019


Avimaia schweitzerae. Credit: BARBARA MARRS

Our April 2nd meeting will be our popular Old Timer’s Night, hosted by our president, Tom General, KE5ICX. We’ll here why our longest-licensed members got into the hobby—and why they stayed.

The club has received information about the funeral services and burial of Chuck Thompson, N5IAG. The viewing will be this Sunday, March 24th; the burial will be this Monday. Please see our Silent Key post for more information.

The contest calendar doesn’t show much this weekend. The NA SSB Sprint is taking place from 19:00 to 23:00 Dallas time tonight, if you’d like to try a short, intense contest.

UPDATE: Gus, W5GUS, mentioned the Light Up 2-Meter Simplex event tomorrow night, March 24th, from 18:00-20:00 local time. You can find out more at their Facebook page or this eHam post.

UPDATE: Gus, W5GUS, mentioned a General license class being offered by the Garland Amateur Radio Club. It starts very soon, on March 28th. More information is available from the Garland ARC training page.

UPDATE: David, KG5EIU, would like to encourage all amateurs who use AREDN to update their firmware to the latest version. Their are MAJOR updates to the operating system that underlies the firmware, as well is the routing protocol used.

And don’t forget our swap and sale items listed here.

In news from the world of ham radio:

Amateurs in Chile were able to help fix a radio used for communications in an isolated area.

Get your tinfoil hats ready! HAARP is about to begin its spring research campaign. Transmissions, mostly below 5 MHz, will take place from March 25th-28th, and there will be special voice and image transmissions for amateur listeners.

The FCC is looking for a field engineer in our area, if you’re in the market for a radio-related job.

If you have a few–or more than a few–Euros to spare, Tunisian amateurs need your help thanks to sky-high license fees and required mandatory radio inspections that they much pay for.

And it sounds like the Smithsonian’s amateur radio club station, NN3SI, will be back on the air next month.

In news from the world of science:

Did we have a geomagnetic storm last night? If you heard any unusual conditions, share them later in the net.

Laying eggs can be dangerous for birds; a condition known as egg binding can be fatal…and it was, 110 million years ago, leading to the first egg ever found inside a bird fossil.

Do you want to see something really scary? Big meteor impacts are much more common than you probably think. A 1-kiloton explosion would not be healthy to be around.

And last but not least, pangolins are really, really cute…but eating their scales won’t make you healthy.

Credit:
Stephencdickson, en.wikipedia.org