Topband: TO4E Story by Dany F5CW

[Bill Tippett]

We are all safe back home since Dec 24th early morning and welcome at Orly 
Airport by F6KOP team who is managing 5V7C DXpedition soon, in March. I 
should be one of them.

TO4E/TO4WW is over ! As you know we were very very frustrated by the lack 
of power there, like so many OM's waiting for us on low bands. Only 34.000 
QSO for about 200 hours on air.

Even in such uncomfortable conditions, we managed to be on air as much as 
possible, and few hours were made barefoot on battery ... an old battery 
found there... and a candle light upon the FT100D ... Even Pascal F5PTM 
managed to work pile up with only 0 at power display... that mean about 0,1 
Watt output for FT100D...

Generators are not missing, We checked out 5 pieces : 5 KVA, 12 KVA , 35 
KVA, 35 KVA and 40 KVA... all diesel engines, but the only rule was to 
respect the charge table for oil from Forces... As Europa is a wildlife 
natural reserve, few quantities of polluting products are stored there.

Few years ago, a big wind generator farm was running with 5 towers ! But 
"ecologists" action stopped this arguing the fans killed birds ! An ongoing 
study could shift towards solar solution soon.

Any way, I would like to thanks very much all pilot station for any action 
made, Your help was very nice for us, and forwarding informations was 
necessary to keep all roaring operators more quiet ! HI.

We will soon issued informations, photos and video to ALL of our 
sponsors... Nearly 5 Gb of digital pictures are stored, and 3 hours of 
video... Still some hours of job to make all ready... HI.

QSL cards will not be printed shortly, We have to make nice cards ! So we 
ask for your patience. Didier, our first and main organizer will gather all 
the team soon to decide the QSL lay out ...

A special thanks to Richard ZS6RO, his packet station helped us for 
messages exchange with Rafik F5CQ and Didier F5OGL. But most of the time 
our station was on duty for pile-ups ... HI !

To conclude, 34.000 QSO in not enough ! But it's more than QSO's made for 
10 or 20 years by sporadic operators going there like Jack FR5ZU who 
provide us a great help... And furthermore we managed to run 160 and 80 
m... and few QSO on 6 meter (MS or tropo) and on 2 m MS. We had a quite 
important activity in RTTY or PSK...

For sure, we will stay ready to go again, as soon as possible. Knowing that 
another power solution will be in our suitcases !

In spite of "few" operators roaring, eating their microphone and unable to 
cope with DX operator notification, Hamspirit is still our keyword !

A BIG THANKS to you,
HNY !
Regards !

Dany F5CW, one of TO4E/TO4WW team. Soon maybe 5V7C , FM/F5CW...

Eric F5JKK, Often on RTTY, and on 6 m / MS ... Avery skilled old timer ! 
Maybe soon FR5 or FY5 or ...

Pascal F5PTM, CW over-all ! but sometimes RTTY and SSB... His first DXpedition.

Freddy F5IRO, CW and SSB ! and few QSO RTTY ! Our turtles hunter... to make 
them safe at sea. soon QSY in FK8...

Jean-louis F5NHJ, often RTTY and SSB, also called "CinqueNove" for his 
Italian skills !

and let him write about myself ! HI.

http://europa2003.free.fr:/europa_infos-e.htm