[TowerTalk] Just for fun reading: Mysterious antennas near Salt Lake City

[Grant Hopper]

Several news outlets had this story, with some providing more detail.
Based on photos of what was inside the case, it's almost certain that these
were Helium miners, 'providing' LoRaWan connectivity as part of the Helium
'network'.  The were not placed there legitimately according to people
connected with Helium, as reported on Reddit.

Grant
KB7WSD

On Wed, Jan 11, 2023 at 4:37 PM Lux, Jim <jim at luxfamily.com> wrote:

> On 1/11/23 4:13 PM, Lux, Jim wrote:
> > On 1/11/23 3:43 PM, n0tt1 at juno.com wrote:
> >>
> https://www.coasttocoastam.com/article/video-series-of-mysterious-antenna
> >>
> >> s-found-throughout-foothills-of-salt-lake-city/
> >>
> >> 73,
> >> Charlie, N0TT
> >>
> >> _______________________________________________
> >>
> >
> > https://youtu.be/lARsgBr3SGg
> >
> > is the KSL-TV story..
> >
> > I'm surprised they didn't just take a spectrum analyzer and watch them
> > (in situ).  Or once they had one, open it up and see what's inside.
> >
> > Probably some sort of mesh network experiment. Good luck with that
> > antenna and feed line lasting the weekend.
> >
> > _
>
>
> s/weekend/winter/
>
>
> I've put payloads like this up on hills (with permission) - but the
> person who gave permission might not be the person who answers the phone
> for a question like "what is that"?  Many range land, public lands
> management orgs have limited staff and it's not like they have some
> master database of everything.  For instance, you might want to put
> something on US Forest Service land, and you talk to the ranger, they
> give you a paper form to fill out, you provide your "certificate of
> insurance", and that gets filed somewhere. It's not in some database or
> indexed, etc.  If someone came by 6 months later and said "I found this
> on peak 6312, what is it?" they'd have no way to figure it out.
>
> They generally do ask you to put a placard of some sort on it, but
> that's more for you, so that you can answer questions, and perhaps to
> discourage people from using it as an improvised target. Or, to take it
> as a souvenir.
>
> This is something that I've given a lot of thought to in schemes for
> diversity or phased arrays or for antenna measurement, particularly on
> receive. These days, with cheap high performance GPS it's pretty
> attractive- Have a GPS, a processor, something like a RTL-SDR and a
> battery and solar panel, with a mesh transceiver (or some convenient
> radio link to bring the data back)
>
> The other way people put stuff out in the wilderness on public lands is
> by filing a mining claim(s). That claim can be pretty sketchy (after all
> you don't give away the true nature of your bonanza - so you say you're
> going to mine gravel). And sure, you're required to do some development
> work on the claim - "Why I installed a remote monitoring system to
> collect geophysical and environmental data to facilitate the future mine
> development." The law requires $100 worth of work or improvements per
> year. (your time lugging that box counts)  iF you're claiming a "mill
> site" it has to be associated with a mineral site, but doesn't have
> extraction - but one thing it could be is "other uses in support of a
> mining operation".
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> TowerTalk mailing list
> TowerTalk at contesting.com
> http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/towertalk
>