Wow - am I dreaming? No way FT5XO is coming in that well a whole 25
minutes before sunrise.
Seems to be working JAs. Guess it isn't a bootlegger.
Listen to that pileup! Wow. W7LR is even in there.
The dog wants out... darn... I run downstairs, let the dog out and even
take a minute for my own comfort and come back. Takes a minute of two
to find out where he is listening - and he is mostly working JAs. I find
the JA he is working and do a quick tailend - holding my breath.
He responds with "N6?".
I have him now - I pull hard on the rod and try to make sure the fish is
really hooked.
Seven seconds later, I am jumping up to touch the ceiling.
http://www.kkn.net/~tree/ft5qso.wav
Eight years ago, "the big one", VK0IR had a similar opening (from what I am
told). I missed it because I had an early meeting at work.
As I explained to my wife, if it wasn't so hard, it wouldn't be as much fun.
That's country #190 for me and zone #36.
Good luck to the other deserving souls who are still involved in the quest.
I hope another opening like this comes along for you.
About 20 minutes after working them, they peaked at my sunrise - at least
5 s-units above the noise. They were Q5 on my transmit antenna (loaded
tower). It seemed that they were having a hard time hearing many of the
stations - which makes me suspect that they were running higher power this
time around. I believe they only have on amplifier and perhaps it was being
shared between 80 and 160. This might explain why they were not on 80 this
AM.
As far as I know, they will be packing up on April 1st - so there may be
two more chance for the west coast.
Finally - when you send in your QSL - you might remember that this type of
operation costs a lot of money to pull off. I know that they had to pay an
extra $5K just for rising fuel costs just before leaving. I encourage you
to think about how much working them means to you - and to give them an
appropriate contribution.
QSL info at qrz.com under FT5XO.
Now - how do I set that alarm clock back to a more reasonable hour?
Tree N6TR/7 in Boring, Oregon
tree@kkn.net
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