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It was quite a busy weekend for our Sun. During the late hours of Friday, July 30, a magnificent coronal mass ejection (CME) billowed away from the eastern limb of the Sun; the source of the blast was apparently sunspot 1092. On Sunday, August 1 at approximately 0855 UTC, Earth-orbiting satellites detected a C3-class solar flare, and again, the blast came from sunspot 1092. At about the same ti...

In July, the FCC released a Report and Order (R&O) that amended Section 97 -- more specifically Section 97.113 -- stating that government entities sponsoring disaster and emergency drills will no longer need to apply for a waiver to hold these drills. Additionally, employees who wish to participate in non-government-sponsored drills and exercises may do so under certain conditions. Section 97 i...

In July, the FCC released a Report and Order (R&O) that would allow amateurs to participate in government-sponsored disaster preparedness drills without a waiver, as well as permit employees, under certain circumstances, to participate in non-government drills on behalf of their employer. In today’s edition of the Federal Register, the FCC issued a Final Rule that the effective date of these ne...

A group of 4th graders at Greeenville Elementary earn their Technician tickets as part of their schools program to become a NASA Explorer School.

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It was quite a busy weekend for our Sun. During the late hours of Friday, July 30, a magnificent coronal mass ejection (CME) billowed away from the eastern limb of the Sun; the source of the blast was apparently sunspot 1092. On Sunday, August 1 at approximately 0855 UTC, Earth-orbiting satellites detected a C3-class solar flare, and again, the blast came from sunspot 1092. At about the same ti...

A group of six Swiss hams have set a new record for the longest contact (based on GPS coordinates) made on 10 GHz using SSB -- 2696 km (1675 miles): from Ilha do Sal (one of the northern Cape Verde islands) to Portugal. Using a 20 W transmitter -- with a 90 cm parabolic reflector with 35 dB gain -- these hams, part of the Hyperatlantica 2010 DXpedition, were able to contact Portugal on the morn...

A group of six Swiss hams have set a new record for the longest contact (based on GPS coordinates) made on 10 GHz using SSB -- 2696 km (1675 miles): from Ilha do Sal (one of the northern Cape Verde islands) to Portugal. Using a 20 W transmitter -- with a 90 cm parabolic reflector with 35 dB gain -- these hams, part of the Hyperatlantica 2010 DXpedition, were able to contact Portugal on the morn...

Compiled by S. Khrystyne Keane, K1SFA
ARRL News Editor
news@arrl.org

This feature -- including convenient Web links to useful information -- is a concise monthly update of some of the things ARRL is doing on behalf of its members. This installment covers the month of July.

The ARRL Board of Directors held its 2010 Second Meeting in Windsor, Connecticut.

ARRL West Division Vice Director John Thomason...

With more than 10,000 fans on Facebook, the ARRL page is the number one spot for hams on the Internet’s most popular social networking site. Not only is the ARRL page the most popular Amateur Radio page on Facebook, it is attracting young -- and not-so-young -- hams to share their opinions and ham radio-related news with other hams.

According to Facebook demographics, more than 100 people betwee...

John, Paul, George and Ringo are on the list. Mozart, Bach, Beethoven and Brahms -- even Frank Zappa and Elvis (but not Madonna). Of course Asimov and Sagan made the cut, Mr Spock, too, but not Captain Kirk. And now ARRL -- more precisely, (31531) ARRL -- joins this prestigious company as one of more than 16,000 named minor planets in our solar system. A minor planet -- such as an asteroid --is...

The ARRL Board of Directors held its Second Meeting of 2010 July 16-17 in Windsor, Connecticut, under the chairmanship of President Kay Craigie, N3KN. International Amateur Radio Union (IARU) Secretary Rod Stafford, W6ROD, and Radio Amateurs of Canada (RAC) President Geoff Bawden, VE4BAW, were guests of the Board. At the two-day meeting, the Board considered a number of reports and acted on sev...

The ARRL Board of Directors held its Second Meeting of 2010 July 16-17 in Windsor, Connecticut, under the chairmanship of President Kay Craigie, N3KN. International Amateur Radio Union (IARU) Secretary Rod Stafford, W6ROD, and Radio Amateurs of Canada (RAC) President Geoff Bawden, VE4BAW, were guests of the Board. At the two-day meeting, the Board considered a number of reports and acted on sev...

Sunspot activity increased again this week, but on Tuesday and Wednesday -- July 27-28 -- a stiff solar wind increased Earth’s geomagnetic activity, which is a negative for HF propagation. Sunspot numbers for July 22-28 were 39, 45, 41, 39, 39, 15 and 31, with a mean of 35.6. The 10.7 cm flux was 87.7, 86.4, 85.2, 85.2, 84.4, 82.6 and 85.3, with a mean of 85.3. The estimated planetary A indices...

By Stan Horzepa, WA1LOU
ARRL Contributing Editor

This week, Surfin’ scours the Internet for yet another musical ham. 

Two weeks running, I have written here about hams I know who sing or sang for a living. In response, Paul Walcott, WD8H, e-mailed me that the late rock crooner Gene Pitney was a ham, too.

That was news to me! Gene Pitney was a Connecticut native, lived 30 miles up I-84 from me, att...

VHF/UHF weak-signal operators across North America are making the final tests on their stations in preparation for the ARRL UHF Contest, coming up the weekend of August 7-8. Most VHF+ weak-signal operation takes place on the two lowest bands of the VHF spectrum -- 6 and 2 meters; however, there is a lot of activity that takes place above 144 MHz in the UHF portion of the radio spectrum and beyo...

While the Federal Register may be the ultimate record of the business of the USA’s Executive Branch, it can be a difficult document to navigate. The Register publishes approximately 80,000 pages of documents each year in the form of Notices, Proposed Rules, Rules and Official Documents; this is where all new and amended rules to Part 97, the Amateur Radio Service, must be published before they ...

Beginning July 28, those who have dealings with the FCC will have a new tool that the FCC claims will put them “within one click of all the information they want” from the Commission: a new “easy-to-use” Consumer Help Center.

“Our new Consumer Help Center makes it easy for consumers to learn about our work and take action,” said FCC Chief of the Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau Joel Guri...

After a higher than expected run on pins for Field Day this year, the ARRL has ordered more and expects them to arrive next month. “The pins were in stock until just before Field Day, but due to some exceptionally high interest, we were unable to fulfill a few final orders,” said ARRL Product Marketing Specialist Jackie Ferreira, KB1PWB. “We have ordered more pins, as many hams enjoy collecting...

By Gary Hoffman, KB0H
ARRL Contributing Editor

My efforts to set up an APRS station (Automatic Packet Reporting System) had come to a standstill. I had installed a program called UI-View32. It was pretty slick, with volumes of data in its Help file, but there were still plenty of parts of it that I didn’t understand. It was time to find an Elmer.

I won’t go into the serendipitous events that led m...

After review of eligibility by the ARRL Ethics and Elections Committee, President Kay Craigie, N3KN, has appointed John Robert Stratton, KE5ISX, of Austin Texas, to serve as Vice Director of the ARRL’s West Gulf Division for the remainder of the current term that expires January 1, 2011. Stratton, an attorney, fills the vacancy created when John Thomason, WB5SYT, resigned the position earlier t...