2024 SEPTEMBER 15 VK NATIONAL NEWS BROADCAST ON VK1WIA ------------------------------------------------------------* THE BEST NEWS YOU'LL GET ALL WEEK THIS LINK IS A VIDEO VERSION OF NEWS COMPILED BY VK5BD BEVAN tinyurl.com/WIA-News-Videos ------------------------------------------------------------* NATIONAL NEWS FOR WEEK COMMENCING SEPTEMBER 15 2024 IN OUR 29th YEAR OF NON STOP NEWS THIS WEEK:- WIA President, Scott Williams VK3KJ NOW WAIT - THERE'S MUCH MUCH MORE IN THIS EDITION OF NEWS FROM THE WIRELESS INSTITUTE OF AUSTRALIA. I'M EDITOR GRAHAM VK4BB WIA JOIN THE WIA tinyurl.com/yyj87b9y This is WIA President, Scott Williams (VK3KJ) and welcome to all listeners to the WIA National News Broadcast this week. What a week of crazy weather we had across the East Coast of Australia and in particular, Victoria and New South Wales. There were reported wind gusts in Victoria of 146km/h in Wilsons Promontory and 132km/h recorded in many Alpine areas. In fact, in my own town just outside of Warragul in Victoria, we recorded wind gusts of 124km/h which caused significant damage to the area. Not the mention over 3 days with no power. I am aware some Amateur Radio operators lost antennas and suffered damage across Victoria. For me it was nothing more than a bent mast out the top of the tower, but I did hear of one person losing several large, sizeable antennas and another that lost a tower, which is most unfortunate indeed. I want to talk to you now about communications with Directors on the WIA Board. In a recent WIA Board meeting, it was decided to formally appoint Directors responsible for various Board Committees. It is acknowledged this is an area that the Board needed to do better and by having a director as a single point of contact related to activity within that Committee would improve dramatically communications. We acknowledge that some communications from working groups or external committees and even just some clubs enquiring on a particular matter, did not necessarily find its way to the board. The Board sets an agenda for each meeting in advance and in the future, we will have these committees as a standing agenda item and the Director responsible for that committee will report to the Board on all committee activity. The appropriate Director will regularly liaise with committee chairs and ensure there is a good flow of information. The Board has decided for the moment to have nine committees. The committees and the appointed Director are: 1. Representation (Scott Williams) covering IARU, ITU, ACMA, International member organisations. 2. Education (Lee Moyle & Giles Kirby) covering the Syllabi, Assessments. 3. Technical (Peter Shrader) covering, TAC, Spectrum Strategy 4. Publications (Lee Moyle) covering AR Magazine, Foundation Manual, News Broadcast 5. Digital (Steve Green) coving Social Media, YouTube, Website 6. Contesting (Chris Dimitrijevic) covering Contesting / Awards / QSL 7. Systems (Peter Clee) covering Memnet, Office staff, Office365 8. Finance / Corporate Services / Governance / Strategy (Scott Williams & Peter Clee) 9. Membership (Peter Clee) covering promotion, retention, structure, benefits, reports. This listing is not an exhaustive list of every committee activity however, this structure will greatly assist with improving communications internally and externally. The WIA will shortly place this list of Board Committees and the appropriate Director that is appointed on our website, wia.org.au This will be placed under WIA Information and then under a new tab that will be named Board Committees. All contact details and the responsibility of the Board Committee will be listed. Thats it for me this week and this has been Scott Williams, WIA President on behalf of the WIA Board. Best Wishes. AUSTRALIANA Traffic increased "four-fold" during Paris games. Nine Entertainment blocked up to 96 million web requests from bots and potentially malicious traffic during this years Paris Olympics. The media organisation's "Fastly" web application firewall filters 1.2 billion daily web and application requests, including on its brands the Australian Financial Review and Nine News. However, during the Olympics, this daily number of requests increased four-fold with some peaks even higher on days such as swimming, Nine technology director of publishing and enterprise practices Andre Lackmann said. Andre also touched on Nines challenges with preventing artificial intelligence bots from lifting its brands content, this is especially important for Nines subscription-based brands like the AFR, The Age and the Sydney Morning Herald. "AI services are increasingly able to summarise that content for these brands so we're taking a more strict stance, Lackmann said. We just updated our robots.txt to be able to enable blocking as much as robots.txt blocks anything. Beyond that, its about scraping at a rate-limiting level, but theres challenges in being able to do it at a more granular level." tinyurl.com/yzurmhkj (itnews) LEAF LETTER! IT'S HOW WE COMMUNICATE. Trees in Melbourne have been receiving fan mail from around the world, YES TREES. The city councils project to assign an email address to each one back some 11 years ago and it's still going strong. The trees are mapped in a project called Urban Forest Visual, with each tree assigned an identification number. Officials in Melbourne, originally assigned email addresses to specific trees so that locals could report issues and damages. Instead, being received daily are thousands of love letters to the trees. One of the letters read, "As I was leaving St. Mary's College today I was struck, not by a branch, but by your radiant beauty. You must get these messages all the time. You're such an attractive tree." The emails have come from as far afield as Russia, Germany, the US, Britain, Hungary, Moldova, Singapore, Brazil, Denmark and Perth. melbourneurbanforestvisual.com.au/ (calm/abc/web) ------------------------------------------------------------* INTERNATIONAL NEWS With thanks to ARRL, DX-WORLD, eHam, Hackaday, IARU, ICQPodcast, IRTS, NEWSLINE, NZART, RAC, Radioworld.com, RSGB, SARL and the World Wide sources of the WIA. Phil A. McBride, VA3QR/HP3QR Radio Amateurs of Canada President and Chair resigns. In an announcement to the hams of Canada Phil said, and I quote. It is with mixed feelings that I announce my resignation as President of Radio Amateurs of Canada, effective November 1, 2024. While leading Canadas national organization has been the pinnacle of my time as a Radio Amateur, my family has moved full-time to Panama and I have secured operating privileges as well as the call sign HP 3 QR. There is a Parks On The Air (POTA) entity about an hour from our house that has never been activated and I plan to fix that! I also plan to become involved with the communitys educational program and show youth in my area the wonders of Amateur Radio. I would like to thank the RAC Board, Executive and volunteers for their support during my time as President and previously as a Regional Director. I would also like to thank you, the member, for the support youve given and continue to give to Radio Amateurs of Canada." Well done and congratulations Phil McBride, RAC President and Chair. Amazon is poised to unveil a significant overhaul of its Alexa virtual assistant, incorporating advanced AI capabilities to create a more personalized and conversational experience. According to reporting by Caroline O'Donovan of The Washington Post and discussed on Tech News Weekly, the new AI-powered Alexa is slated for a mid-October release. Key features of the upgraded Alexa include: Conversational AI: The new Alexa aims to be more "likable" and "charismatic," engaging in natural conversations and remembering user preferences. Personalization: Alexa will ask questions about users and their families, using this information to tailor responses and recommendations. Enhanced shopping features: Alexa will monitor prices for items users express interest in and alert them to price drops. Unlike the current free version, the AI-powered Alexa will be a paid product. While the new features show promise, concerns remain about privacy, especially regarding children's interactions with AI. Additionally, the launch's proximity to the U.S. election raises questions about how Amazon will handle potential misinformation risks. As Amazon prepares to roll out this major update, it remains to be seen how consumers will respond to a paid, AI-enhanced Alexa and whether it can compete effectively in the rapidly evolving AI assistant market. Interestingly when we first came across this story, top of page the disclaimer "AI created, human edited." Yes a rapidly changing world we live in don't we. twit.tv/posts/tech/amazons-alexa-set-major-ai-upgrade-fall YOU NEVER NEVER KNOW - TILL YOU GIVE IT A TRY. A great way to encourage new members to ham radio and their National Society was shown by the IRTS, Irish Radio Transmitters Society at a very successful and fun participation in the Dublin Maker 2024 festival. Over two days, the IRTS stand proved very popular and had massive crowds on both days. Tony EI5EM's homebrew equipment was a big hit with everyone who stopped by the stall. To encourage the kids to try some CW any kid who sent their name by Morse got to design a badge which they took away with them. Also, on both days a free raffle was held for a chance to win an SDR dongle. Nokia and Axiom Space have announced a partnership to integrate advanced 4G/LTE communication capabilities into the next-generation spacesuits that will be used for the Artemis III lunar mission. Axiom Spaces spacesuits will provide astronauts with advanced capabilities while providing NASA with commercially developed human systems needed to access, live and work on and around the Moon. Nokia, meanwhile, plans to deploy the first cellular network on the Moon as part of Intuitive Machines IM-2 mission, which is scheduled to be delivered to the launch site in 2024. During the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris, ensuring robust and reliable communication for public safety forces was a top priority. One of the critical tools that proved integral to this effort was the M.D.R. (Mic Dual Radio). This innovative device played a crucial role not only during the Olympic Torch Relay but also throughout the entire duration of the Games, maintaining secure and seamless communication across various public safety units. French Police and Gendarmerie equipped over 28,000 officers with the MDR. This large-scale deployment underscored the importance of the MDR in ensuring that all units, regardless of their location or the communication network they were using, remained connected. The MDR provided dual connectivity, allowing simultaneous communication over both legacy professional mobile radio (PMR) systems and mobile networks through smartphones tinyurl.com/36bnrm94 ------------------------------------------------------------------- OPERATIONAL NEWS - A FELIX VK4FUQ PRESENTATION -------------- -------------- NOW CONTEST WISE:- 2024 -------------- -------------- Oceania DX Contest Dates/Times: PH - The first full weekend in October each year from 0600 UTC Saturday to 0600 UTC Sunday CW - The second full weekend in October each year from 0600 UTC Saturday to 0600 UTC Sunday Log deadline for PH and CW logs - 31 October. This years contest will be held on October 5th and 12th respectively. oceaniadxcontest.com wia.org.au/members/contests/oceania/ ------------------- INTERNATIONAL EARTH - MOON - EARTH CONTEST 0000 Zulu, November 16 - 2359 Zulu , November 17 Work as many amateur stations as possible via the earth-moon-earth path on any authorized amateur frequency above 50 MHz. EME Logs due back to the ARRL December 17. ------------------- VHF UHF Field Day Upcoming Contest Date & Time Spring 2024 - 0100 UTC Saturday 23 November through 0059 UTC Sunday 24 November (0400 / 0359 in VK6). wia.org.au/members/contests/vhfuhf/ ------------------- YOTA CONTEST Youth on the air test 3 of 3 will be from 10:00 to 21:59 UTC on 29 December on the five classic bands CW and SSB. (yota) ----------------------------------------------------------------- DX WINDOW TO THE WORLD. -------------- MALAYSIA To celebrate Malaysia Day, special callsign 9M61S has been active until the 16th of September. Operators are working on the HF bands using SSB, CW and digital modes. For more information see QRZ.com (rsgb) --------------- Be listening for the Zurich City Police Radio Amateur Club throughout the year, operating as HB 2 SP the club is marking its 20th anniversary. Unfortunately no Bureau QSL's but you can use Logbook Of The World, and HB20SP runs until December 31. (sourced to ARNewsLine 2410) -------------- Listen throughout the year for the special callsign 9 A 1 RKZ marking the 100th anniversary of the Radioklub Zagreb which was founded the 24th of March 1924 in Croatia QSL via 9A1ADE. (ARNewsLine 2410) -------------- DXpedition to Namibia. This DXpedition will run from the end of October through the first week of November. Call-Sign will be V 55 LA. With their QTH already secured, the team is now working on the antenna farm layout and exploring options to make the most of their ideal location. M0OXO is QSL Manager for V55LA. ( m0oxo.com/ ) ------------- AUSTRIA OE100RADIO [OSCAR-ECHO-ONE-HUNDRED-ROMEO-ALPHA-DELTA-INDIA-OSCAR] is active until the 31st of December celebrating the 100th anniversary of the beginning of regular radio transmissions in Austria in 1924. The station has heard recently on the 40m band using CW. QSL via the Bureau. (gb2rs) ---------- BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA. E 7 100 RADIO is the special call sign for the Bosnia and Herzegovina IARU member society to celebrate 100 years of amateur radio innovation, community, and advocacy. QSL via operators' instructions. (eHam) ------------- Y Listen for TM 24 JPO until the 8th of September for the Paralympic Games, QSL TM24JPO by the operators home station F 8 GGZ (dx net) ----------- Y AUSTRALIA VI7POL For 2024 National Police Week in Australia, a special event call of VI 7 POL will be on air. The call will be active between 14th September an 29th September to celebrate the 7th annual National Police Week, a celebration of our nations police. National Police Week includes the 15th annual Wall to Wall Ride For Remembrance and National Police Remembrance Day on 27th September. National Police Remembrance Day is a time to pause to honour the 826 Australian police officers whose lives have been lost while performing their duty. It is a time to remember police officers who have lost their lives through illness or other circumstances. VI7POL will be active on 10, 15, 20, 40, & 80m SSB, FT8, and FT4. More information on VI7POL including QSL information can be found on QRZ.com. 73 Paul VK5PAS. -------------- Y K4A The Alabama Contest Group will be operating the 9-11 Remembering Our Heroes special event September 8-11. The K4A special event station will be on the air to honour the victims of 9-11. This year a new special QSL and certificate "Honouring Our Heroes" theme will be available. To those who contact K4A on 3 bands using any combination of bands/modes the group will offer a full colour glossy certificate on heavy paper which will be mailed in a full size Manila envelope all postage paid by the Alabama Contest Group, EVEN if here in Australia. (or any DX). (ard) -------------- Y SOUTH COOK. Thomas, N2WLG is active as E 51 WLG until September 8 from 40 to 10 meters using CW and digital. QSL E51WLG via LoTW, home call (N2WLG), direct or bureau. (dx-world) -------------- Y HB0, LIECHTENSTEIN Leo, DL2COM and Roman, DL3TU will be active (CW only) from the Principality of Liechtenstein the end of September or early October. Weather permitting they will operate Field Day style for two days from the summit of Augstenberg which is 2359 meters A.S.L. using just 50-100 watts and directional antennas. The location has been carefully chosen to allow a good take off to VK. Both ops say they are happy to log as many callers as possible but will focus on VK/ZL/JA during UTC morning. Updates, such as the exact dates, will be published on their QRZ.com pages. QSL via their home callsigns DL2COM and DL3TU in LoTW, direct or via the bureau. (dx world) -------------- Y NEW ZEALAND NZART has a special event call sign for the upcoming America's Cup to be held in Spain later this year. ZL 6 AMCUP has been allocated to celebrate this event with Phil Garside ZL2RO as the trustee of the callsign. November 30 is when ZLCAMCUP goes off air. (NZART) -------------- Y OL 80 C.A.R.B.O.N. is active until the 30th of November to mark the 80th anniversary of Operation Carbon during World War Two. This operation involved the dropping of paratroopers in the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. The Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia was a partially-annexed territory of Nazi Germany that was established in 1939 after the German occupation of the Czech lands A team of operators is active using call OL 80 CARBON on CW, SSB and digital modes on the HF bands. More information is available on QRZ.com -------------- Y Celebrating the 100th anniversary of Radio Belgrade, the Belgrade Amateur Radio Club is active as YT 100 RB and YU 1924 RB until November 30. For details of a certificate that is available, see yu1ano.org (rsgb) ------------------------------------------------------------* WW SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS - BALLOONS What activity entails playing with hydrogen gas, sending a fox to 105,000 feet in altitude, ingesting large plates of comfort food, hiking through dense brush, wading through creeks and running from the bulls? A recent West Georgia (USA) Amateur Radio Society high-altitude balloon launch included all these things and more. True to form, predictions based on the last known coordinates of the balloon -- from the Automatic Packet Reporting System onboard- brought the clubs hunters very close to its landing zone. Brian, WX4BK is the payload specialist BUT, Murphy was following Brian and the payload around for a week, WX4BK's persistence finally won out. The payload including a raspberry pi, GPS, APRS transmitter to send out coordinates and altitude, a cross-band repeater, pressure and temperature sensors (gets pretty cold up there) digital cameras and "The RF Fox" was found. (eHam) WW SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS --- DEFENSE Captain John Konrad (gCaptain author) Could future naval battles be waged using Morse code flashed between ships? One admiral believes so. At the 3rd Indo-Pacific Security Conference 2024, held at the Bundeswehr Command and Staff College in Hamburg, Germany, a question arose about the ability of navies to protect tankers and replenishment oilers in the event of war in the Western Pacific. In a gCaptain article Captain Steve Carmel, a former Vice President for Maersk LLP said the United States Merchant Marine is at least 100 tankers short of meeting basic energy needs in the event of war in the Pacific, it will therefore be incredibly important to protect the few tankers and oilers they do have in the Pacific. Communication poses a significant challenge too. The flag officer noted that even sophisticated communication systems on advanced warships can be jammed by equipment on enemy facilities and ships. As a result, convoys and even battle groups might have to rely on Morse code via blinker lights. Although seemingly old fashioned, this method provides a dependable way to communicate, less prone to electronic warfare. Blinker lights transmitting Morse code would allow vital information to be sent even during intense jamming. This highlights the need to maintain traditional communication skills alongside modern technology. (eHam) WW SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS - FINAL FRONTIER AMSAT-VK Secretary - secretary@amsat-vk.org JAXA has officially ended the mission of SLIM, Japan's first Moon lander. Originally only expected to operate for a single lunar day and then feared to be doomed after it landed in the incorrect orientation after losing an engine bell, the mission managed to survive THREE (3) lunar nights and complete All pre-mission success criteria. SLIM is the only lunar lander to successfully perform a pinpoint landing, arriving within 10 meters of its selected landing site. [ANS] The average age of a GPS satellite is now 13 years, with half of them exceeding their designed lifespan. The USA-132 satellite broke the record for the oldest GPS satellite in history, having completed 27+ years in operation. While the record is an indicator of the reliability and robust engineering of the GPS satellite, it also means that the service still relies on hardware built in the 1990s. 31 GPS satellites are in operation today, down from 36 in 2016. The GPS system was primarily designed for military purposes but was opened up to wide-scale civilian use in 1983. Since then, GPS has grown into one of the most widely used services in the world, with billions of people using GPS on a daily basis today. The overall GPS network still works well. But the aging satellites, coupled with the delays in the launch schedule for new satellites, threaten its competitive edge as international rivals bring into service their own GNSS systems and private companies develop alternatives. (ANS) WW SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS - MILITARY Recordings of military transmissions can be found on the Signal Identification Guide Wiki at sigidwiki.com/wiki/Category:Military Operation Market Garden was an Allied military operation during the Second World War fought in the German-occupied Netherlands. Its objective was to create a 103 km salient into German territory with a bridgehead over the Lower Rhine River, creating an Allied invasion route into northern Germany. A BRIDGE TOO FAR was a movie of this operation and the taking of the bridge at Arnhem. This was to be achieved by two sub-operations: MARKET and GARDEN. Combined US and British airborne forces (Market) followed by British land forces swiftly following over the bridges (Garden). It was the largest airborne operation of the war up to that point, perhaps the most famous, after D-Day, in the entire history of the Second World War. Special event station in the region commemorating 80 years of freedom is PA 80 OMG back again for the fourth consecutive time and will take place from 13 September up to 19 September 2024. radioclublimburg.nl/pa80omg/ (eHam) WW SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS --- RESCUE RADIO INDIA In a recent meeting with Kolkata health department officials, amateur radio operators proposed a small device which can be used like a panic button' by doctors, nurses and other healthcare workers in hospitals in case of an emergency. Using Ultra High Frequency, this device will be portable and can also be connected with the nearest phone system. These panic buttons will be useful in connecting anyone within a three-kilometre radius, especially in areas which are known as 'voice shadow zones' since a lot of hospitals in Kolkata have trouble with network coverage on their premises. timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/113175480.cms (eHam) --------------------------------------------------------------------- 2024 IT'S A DATE Clubs are welcome to email text with audio for this section Details of all WIA affiliated clubs and societies can be found on the WIA website, including email addresses and website links. ---------------------------- VK4 - SUNFEST was Saturday 14th at Coolum Civic Centre. (vk4vp) VK6 - PerthTech 2024 Sept 21 for 2 days at Gidgegannup (vk6pop) VK4 - GOLD COAST HAMFEST OCTOBER 13 at Nerang Country Paradise Parklands 231 Beaudesert-Nerang Road Nerang. (vk4DMH) VK5 - Amateur Radio Experiments Group Radio & Electronics Sale Saturday 26th October 10AM David Roche Park Kilburn (vk5qi) VK7 - Tasmanian Ham Conference November 2 and 3 Hobart. (vk7news) Held at the Sandy Bay Campus of UTAS. VK3 - SPARC Rosebud RadioFest November 17 at Eastbourne Primary School, Allambi Ave. Rosebud. (vk3pdg) Reception Reports WIA News rebroadcasters often give Short Wave Listeners a welcome to the broadcast as they commence call-backs straight after the Local News. Local news follows National news in all states. It would be great if those SWL's would email their reception reports and location to callbacks@wia.org.au Submitting news items If you would like to submit news items for possible inclusion in the VK1WIA broadcasts, please email your item in text to nationalnews@wia.org.au and don't JUST send url's links or posters, but take the time to pen YOUR contribution. To submit audio, email nationalnews@wia.org.au and send BOTH the audio and the text We would appreciate items certainly no longer than 1.5 mts in length as we only have a half hour. Remember the sooner you submit material the more the likelihood of it being broadcast in the very next edition of WIA National News. Each recorded item will only be broadcast once, if you want a couple of mentions, please submit different slants to keep your event 'fresh' and always if the news room is to read your item --- write it in the 3rd person. (First if YOU are reading your own item). If you are mentioning your own name / call in the story, say something like "and myself, Pat, vk11abc" Promote your local rebroadcast; details on wia.org.au/members/broadcast/contribute/ A reminder when supplying HamFest info we obviously can't plug DEALS from commercial traders "on air", but we at the WIA will put your supporters 'goods' in this text edition "no worries." We will not give blatant 'plugs' to raffles, be it raffles at the event or "on-line". ------------------------------------------------------------* Oh... and to contact us with your news because If It Matters To You It Matters To Us! Click the links below to download the most recent edition of National News, BUT this is ONLY the backup site! WIANEWS backup thanks to Brendan VK4BLP can be found on wiaq.org.au BACKUPS OF THE BACKUP!! thanks to Tony VK7AX www.vk7ax.id.au/wianews/ wia.org.au/members/broadcast/wianews/ (This is the link to the original text version and original audio on wia site) ------------------------------------------------------------* WIANews - we've reported...YOU decide. TWITTER twitter.com/VK1WIA Societies and Club News Letter Editors can EXCHANGE a feed prior to the actual broadcast date, e-mail nationalnews@wia.org.au Call-backs follow the RF editions, but also for text readers you may lodge a quick reply to let us know you read it, who knows, you might even get a "cheerio call". Thanks to our dedicated band of broadcast volunteers who utilize their time and equipment in bringing you this weekly broadcast. Who and where are they? wia.org.au/members/broadcast/where/ Promote your local rebroadcast; details on wia.org.au/members/broadcast/contribute/ The purpose of "WIANews" is to rapidly provide news of interest to WIA affiliated clubs and active amateurs residing in Australia and the globe. We strongly encourage membership in the Wireless Institute of Australia and participation in the activities of local clubs. Opinions expressed in "WIANews" are those of the writers who submit material and do not necessarily reflect those of the rebroadcasters, nor the National WIA, but IF broadcast, are done so in the spirit in which they were submitted." If you would like to see the call-backs reported each broadcast, OR have call-backs to contribute to the National News call back tally then please send through your call-backs to callbacks@wia.org.au How do I join this National News List? (subscribe for an automatic weekly feed.) Email to vk1wia-news-join@lists.wia.org.au from the email account that you wish the emails to go to. How do I leave this National News List? (unsubscribe your weekly feed) Open mail program which sends mail from the address you want to unsubscribe from. Send unsubscribe to the list unsubscribe address vk1wia-news-leave@lists.wia.org.au You will be sent a confirmation mail and must follow the instructions given in that mail to complete the unsubscription. Once your unsubscription has been processed, you will probably receive a message confirming your unsubscription from the list and at that point you should stop receiving messages. ------------------------------------------------------------*