I would have had nightmares for years if I'd witnessed that. I may have them
anyway just hearing about it.
On Apr 14, 2014, at 12:51 PM, Rick - DJ0IP / NJ0IP wrote:
> Sure there was... Government stupidity and its insistence on wasting tax
> payers' money!
>
> 73 - Rick, DJ0IP
> (Nr. Frankfurt am Main)
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: TenTec [mailto:tentec-bounces@contesting.com] On Behalf Of James
> Duffer
> Sent: Monday, April 14, 2014 8:17 PM
> To: Discussion of Ten-Tec Equipment
> Subject: Re: [TenTec] How much for an Orion III?
>
> Such a sad tale. Sorry to hear of such destruction of good and harmless
> equipment. Harmless as there was no "just" reason for the destruction.
> Jim, wd4air
>
>> From: Rick@DJ0IP.de
>> To: tentec@contesting.com
>> Date: Mon, 14 Apr 2014 20:09:03 +0200
>> Subject: Re: [TenTec] How much for an Orion III?
>>
>> I can answer some of that, first hand.
>>
>> In about 1973, the US Army in Europe (USAREUR) decided to close down
>> hf and go fully to VHF and UHF.
>> Hundreds of S-Lines and KWM-2A's were collected and brought to the
>> army disposal center in south western Germany.
>>
>> I was custodian of a MARS station in Berlin and on TDY in the area of
>> the disposal center, so I dropped in to see if I could scrounge
>> anything to distribute through the MARS channels to our members.
>> There I witnessed the beautiful Collins radios stacked by the hundreds, in
> an area of about 50 ft.
>> by 75 ft - being destroyed!
>>
>> There were a few guys working hard destroying them. Every tube was
>> being broken with a hammer and the chassis of each was cut in half with a
> torch.
>>
>> Seems they had been used by the Army Security Agency and they were
>> afraid there might be some residual top secret data still inside some of
> the tube.
>>
>>
>> I did everything I could to try and stop the action but to no avail.
>> Everyone on site was just following orders and they were not willing
>> to pause while I tried to find a solution. All of the radios were all
>> completely destroyed.
>>
>> I was in tears. I could have made every MARS member in Germany's
>> dream come true if some moron hadn't have taken the decision to destroy
> them.
>>
>> So that's what happened to our military S-Lines here in Europe.
>>
>> 73 - Rick, DJ0IP
>> (Nr. Frankfurt am Main)
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: TenTec [mailto:tentec-bounces@contesting.com] On Behalf Of Dave
>> Edwards
>> Sent: Monday, April 14, 2014 6:16 PM
>> To: tentec@contesting.com
>> Subject: Re: [TenTec] How much for an Orion III?
>>
>> Also interesting (to think about)...
>> I wonder what percentage of them still exist today?
>>
>> How many does the government still own?
>>
>> How many remain on dusty shelves somewhere....unopened???
>>
>> ....Dave
>>
>>
>>
>> On 4/14/14, 9:56 AM, Rsoifer@aol.com wrote:
>>> I asked Rod, K0DAS (retired from Rockwell Collins), how many KWM-2s
>>> were bought by hams rather than Uncle Sam. He said that nobody
>>> really knows, but his best guess is that the U.S. armed forces
>>> bought between 1/4 and 1/3 of them. Some went to other government
>>> agencies as well as foreign governments. That still leaves quite a
>>> few that were
>> bought by hams like me.
>>>
>>> 73 Ray W2RS
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> TenTec mailing list
>>> TenTec@contesting.com
>>> http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/tentec
>>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> TenTec mailing list
>> TenTec@contesting.com
>> http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/tentec
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> TenTec mailing list
>> TenTec@contesting.com
>> http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/tentec
>
> _______________________________________________
> TenTec mailing list
> TenTec@contesting.com
> http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/tentec
>
> _______________________________________________
> TenTec mailing list
> TenTec@contesting.com
> http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/tentec
_______________________________________________
TenTec mailing list
TenTec@contesting.com
http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/tentec
|