‰ Now 18 WPM transition file follows ‰

a california radio amateur played a part in rescuing a us sailor
attempting to single handedly circumnavigate the globe. mike
morales, kc6cyk, of riverside, told arrl he was able to contact
fellow radio amateurs in chile to obtain and relay reassuring
information to the family of ken barnes, whose 44 foot ketch was
foundering off south america. a chilean trawler, polar pesca 1,
rescued barnes from his disabled vessel on january 5. AMSAT OSCAR
coordinator Bill Tynan, W3XO, has announced that the RAFT 1 and ANDE
Amateur Radio CubeSats have been issued OSCAR numbers. Both
spacecraft were placed into Earth orbit from the space shuttle
Discovery on December 21 and are projects of US Naval Academy
midshipmen. RAFT 1 has been designated as NAV OSCAR 60 or NO 60.
ANDE has been designated as NAV OSCAR 61, or NO 61‚ Average daily
sunspot numbers for the years 1999 through 2006 were 136R3, 173,
170R3, 176R6, 109R2, 68R6, 48R9 and 26R1. Average daily solar flux
for the same years was 153R7, 179R6, 181R6, 179R5, 129R2, 106R6,
91R9 and 79R9. The numbers above show a very clear decline, which is
easier to perceive when the numbers are averaged over relatively
long periods, such as a year. Looking at quarterly averages, we see
a little more variability, but the same definite decline over time.
Comparing those yearly numbers to a decade ago when the cycle was
near the bottom, average daily sunspot numbers for 1995 to 1997 were
28R7, 13R2 and 30R7. From the first quarter of 2004 through the
fourth quarter of 2006, the average daily sunspot number was 72R9,
71R3, 69R3, 61, 46R1, 55R7, 58, 36, 18R1, 39R7, 23R5 and 23R1. Now
compare that to just a month earlier, December 5, 2006, on page 11
of another report also on the sec.noaa.gov web site. The one from
last month shows the minimum centered around May 2007 with a
smoothed sunspot number of 7, but the current issue shows a minimum
smoothed sunspot number of 10 stretching from December 2006 through
July 2007. The JAPY DX Group in Brazil has a VHF/UHF expedition for
the first week of 2007 to Comprida Island, IOTA SA 024, through
January 7. This is a 70 km long barrier island, part of the state of
Sao Paulo, and the grid locator is GG64bx. This is around 25R028
degrees south latitude, 47R875 degrees west longitude. They are
hoping to work trans equatorial propagation into the Caribbean, and
will be on SSB and CW on 50R11, 144R2 and 432R1 MHz, and FM on
144R54 and 433R1 MHz after 2200z daily using calls PY2OC, PY2ENO and
PY2ZX‚

‰ End of 18 WPM transition file ‰