Annual 42nd Marine Corps Marathon

The Amateur Radio Emergency Service® (ARES) consists of licensed amateurs who have voluntarily registered their qualifications and equipment, with their local ARES leadership, for communications duty in the public service when disaster strikes.  For many of our W4OVH members, we register with the Prince William County ARES (PWCARES) organization and as all Ham radio Operators know, “When All Else Fails… Amateur Radio” is there! You need to be equipped with sustaining skills. What if when you get to a location, there is no food and the sleeping conditions are undesirable? Before you leave on your assignment, you need to make sure you have coping skills that enable you to be able to do your job operating under the conditions you are assigned to—from hardship conditions to making sure you’re able … Read more >>

Support to PWC ARES and Quantico Triathlon & 20K Run

Just a quick post to say thank you to all of the support participants from W4OVH that joined in with the Prince William County Amateur Radio Emergency Services (PWCARES) team to help support the Marine Corp Marathon (MCM) Organizations simultaneous Quantico Triathlon and Quantico 12K Run.  Although David Lane, KG4GIY was unable to be present for the event, he planned and developed the support effort and turned the final implementation over to Greg Gresham, KM4CCG and myself and we had the easy task of working with our outstanding support volunteer team to make it all happen. The Triathlon and 12K Run was a success with more than eleven hundred participants starting their respective events by either jumping into the Potomac for the 750 meter swim or starting off on a 12K … Read more >>

Additional Eclipse Operating Information

W4OVH, If you are interested in operating during the eclipse, there is a contest.   The rules are at http://hamsci.org/seqp-rules.  There are lots of bonus points available. The contest exchange is Call Sign, Signal Report, 6-Character Grid Square. If you do not know your 6-character gird square, you can look it up on QRZ by  looking up your call and then the details tab and finding ‘grid square.  You will have to log onto QRZ to get that info. If you live in the Manassas area,  my Grid square and that of Gil, KM4OZH, is FM18GR. and that should be close. There is a special logging option in N1MM logger for this contest.   They basically want cabrillo format.    If you keep a paper log,  I will help you get it into … Read more >>

Sunshine Corner August

SUNSHINE CORNER Happy August birthday wishes to Kristen / NoCall, John / KK4TCE, Karl / W4KRL, Matthew / KK4SYM, Stu / W4PR, Serge / KK4ZUT, Ronnell / KK4ZUR, Vern / K0LVS, Duane / KK4BZ and Ray / KK4AQR. John KG4NXT and I attended the Berryville Hamfest and saw several OVH members there. Great hamfest weather and it looked like a nice turnout; the tailgate area was completely full. Did anybody win a door prize? Special thanks to the following for their help with getting the trailer scrubbed – John / KG4NXT, Ray / KM4EKR, Sandy / KM4JUS, Dick / WN7S and Terry / KC4DV, great job! Here is our very own Steve N4OGR and his bride Jan KE4TMW. They participated in a square dance performance at the Prince William County Fair … Read more >>

New W4OVH Monthly Meeting Home and Schedule

Greetings All, I just wanted to announce that the September OVH meeting location has changed. For the next year, OVH’s home will be the Buckhall VFD hall. The September meeting will be held on September 19th from 1930 to 2100. The meetings will be every third Tuesday of the month at Buckhall, from 1930 to 2100 as before. I want to give a very special thanks to Robert Saul in helping making this happen. Also I want to thank Jeff our VP for his fine help in this hunting process. Thank you all for bearing with us as we went through this search. I will try to be on the air tonight, if I can get part of my shack ready for use. One last thing, if I have missed anyone, … Read more >>

VP’s Corner

VP’s Corner Jeff Fuller WB6UIE Since many of you will be on travel to view the eclipse or off on vacation with your family, we’ve decided to postpone the club meeting until next month.  Our next meeting will be held on Monday 18 September in the Developmental Services Building at the Prince William County Center.  Map and details will be posted on the web page. Next month is National Emergency Preparedness Month.  This is a good time for everyone to check their emergency kits and portable rigs and make sure your batteries are charged.  NOAA is forecasting this year’s hurricane season to be an active one. Speaking of emergency power, how many of you are involved with solar backup or charging?  If so, let me know if you would like to … Read more >>

W4OVH August Club Meeting POSTPONED

*** IMPORTANT *** Greetings All, Due to the once in a lifetime event, the Solar Eclipse and all of the related QSO parties to work the propagation, a decision has been made. The August meeting of OVH has been postponed until September. We will be looking forward for the reports on how it was. Please be careful out there. 73 Ray KM4EKR