The Ohio/Penn Dx PacketCluster
DX Special Bulletin No. 1197.2
BID: $OPDX.1197.2
January 17, 2015
Editor Tedd Mirgliotta, KB8NW
Provided by BARF80.ORG (Cleveland, Ohio)

Thanks to the Northern Ohio Amateur Radio Society, Northern Ohio DX Association, Ohio/Penn PacketCluster Network, AB5K & the AR TelNet Clusters Network and W0GJ for the following DX information.

K1N Navassa Press Release 17 January 2015

Within two weeks the K1N Navassa DXpedition should be QRV with up to 7-8 stations. Our exact departure date will be decided at the last moment by USFWS and weather windows. The team will be arriving at our staging point a few days before the earliest possible window and will be ready for a rapid deployment. As soon as USFWS has landed on the island and declared it is safe to proceed, we will start the helicopter flights and commence operations. We hope to have a basic camp established by the end of the first day and if things go extremely well, we hope to have several stations on the air by nightfall on the second day. Helicopter deployment will continue for a total of three days before the camp is fully established. A boat landing is not possible this time of year and also helicopter sling loads off our standby vessel are impossible. . So, additional equipment and supplies will be moved ashore with manpower. This will not be an easy project!

The K1N operation is your only opportunity in 32 years to work this #1 Most Wanted Entity. It has been 22 years since the last operation and USFWS will not permit another operation for at least ten years. For these reasons, and in the spirit of worldwide cooperation and good will, we ask that if you already have QSOs with Navassa on certain bands from a previous operation, DO NOT CALL US ON THAT BAND! ClubLog Leader Board will be turned off for obvious reasons.

The latest details and pictures can be found at www.navassadx.com. This web page is now available in 44 languages, including, of course, Klingon! We are leaving no one out of this DXpedition because of its rarity. Our stations will be at “the usual” DX frequencies, listening up, but in some cases, down, for certain parts of the world’s band plan. It is absolutely necessary to listen to the instructions of the DXpedition operator. We have a Facebook page to watch and a Twitter feed (@navassa2015) to follow for instant updates. We will be listening in the U.S. General/Advanced bands.

Band modes will be somewhat limited in an all-out effort to work the bands down to the last little pistol (and Klingon) for this unique opportunity. At least one station will be on 20 meters 24 hours/day. 160M and 12M will be CW only and 10M will be SSB only. Other bands will in some pattern, alternating CW & SSB. At least one station will always be on RTTY, and we will operate RTTY on no more than three bands.

N2OO Bob, is our chief pilot. HK1R Jorge, is our South American pilot, JA1ELY Toshi, (assisted by Yuki JH1NBN) for Asia, MMØNDX Col, for Europe, V51B Andre, for Africa and ZL2AL Lee, for Oceania. Nodir EY8MM is our deep Asia pilot where propagation will be weakest. Our U.S. pilots are K2SG Tony, and KF5NYQ Brandon, is our youth pilot. You can contact your pilot via email; each pilot's address is on his team bio page on our website. Pilots are your way to provide important feedback to the team on the island. Be concise and make your comments pertinent. The worldwide feedback will be prioritized, summarized and forwarded to the Island. Pilots will attempt to answer questions if they are able to do so. Pilots will NOT have access to the logs so do not ask about busted calls, log entries, etc. Logs will be uploaded several times daily to ClubLog.

As you can see in the following propagation prediction diagram for North America, we will have high grade communication on several bands 24 hours daily. The same is true for South America.

Contrast this to the predicted propagation to Japan and India:

Europe has some variability, but Poland shows an “average” propagation for the European continent. There should be 24 hours of daily propagation to Europe…on some band!

You should be grateful to have others standby while we work YOU for an All Time New One. It is only fair to ask that YOU stand by while work others for an All Time New One. As can be seen on the European diagram, we ask for patience in Europe while we work into deep Asia and other areas, as the band openings are nearly simultaneous. Please LISTEN to the operator’s instructions. We will not work stations from outside the area we are calling. With cooperation, everyone will get into our logs FASTER!

Deliberate QRM has been a major hindrance on both ends of the pileups in recent years and is worsening. There is a tab on our website where you can help us identify QRMing stations. This tab will not be active until the DXpedition comes on the air. By entering the data requested, and if enough data is entered, even with crude or rough beam headings, a “heat map” can be produced with mathematical analysis of the data. This was covertly tested during the recent FT4TA Tromelin DXpedition and even with limited data input; several deliberate QRMing stations could be identified within a very small area! Again, the more data that is provided the more accurate the “heat” can be put on offending stations. The QRM problem is one reason we are not publishing our operating frequencies, but we will be on or near the “usual” DXpedition frequencies. If we do experience QRM, we have planned tactics to minimize the malicious interference. Hint: Listen, LISTEN and LISTEN MORE for us….we might try to “wiggle” out of it! We will also try hard to keep our splits narrow as possible to avoid annoying non-DXers who have been known to “bother” a pileup.

K1N QSL information/manager:

Bob Schenck, N2OO
P.O. Box 345
Tuckerton, NJ 08087 USA

U.S.A. Direct: Minimum S.A.S.E. (Self-Addressed Stamped Envelope)
World Direct: S.A.E. (Self-Addressed Envelope) plus minimum $2 or 1 IRC
OQRS Direct and bureau: via CLUBLOG
Regular Bureau: via N2OO c/o the W2 QSL Bureau
LOTW: Sooner rather than later.

We greatly appreciate the generous contributions from individuals and DX clubs around the world! We are just shy of meeting our transportation obligations and have yet to meet the cost of “the rest” of the DXpedition. As always, we encourage contributions to help meet the uncovered expenses. The team has contributed basically half of the entire cost and would appreciate any possible help. U.S. donations could be tax- deductible through NCDXF. (See instructions on website.)

The next press release will be when the landing operations commence. After that, daily progress and pictures will be posted on the website.

From the K1N Navassa Team:
Bob K4UEE, Glenn WØGJ, Mike NA5U, George AA7JV, Ralph KØIR, John K6MM, Craig K9CT, Tomi KT4TTT, Lou N2TU, George N4GRN, Mike N6MZ, Jeff NM1Y, John W2GD, Gregg W6IZT & Jerry WB9Z

….we hope to see you in the logs!!!

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