Subj : SA Radio League News Bulletin for Sunday 1 July 2001
To : SA Radio League
From : Richard Peer
Date : Sat Jun 30 2001 04:33 pm
SOUTH AFRICAN RADIO LEAGUE
SARL NEWS SUNDAY 1 JULY 2001
This is Amateur Radio Station ZS6SRL transmitting Amateur Radio News, a
service by the South African Radio League, the National society for Amateur
Radio in South Africa, for the interest of all radio amateurs, short-wave
listeners and electronic enthusiasts. For a complete list of broadcast times
and frequencies please send a SASE to Amateur Radio News, SARL, P O Box 1721,
Strubensvallei 1735.
This bulletin is also available on the SARL's web pages hosted by Intekom at
www.sarl.org.za, as well as the packet radio bulletin board system. You may
also request
[email protected] to e-mail it to you in either text or MSWord
6.0 format.
SILENT KEYS
It is with great sadness that the DARC announces the passing away of Malcolm
"Mally" Russel - ZS5LZ. He passed away on Wednesday 20th June, 2001. Mally
was well known in the Durban area. He was a member of the Durban Amateur
Radio Club and served as Secretary of the club for the last three years. He
was also was well known for his function as Morse Code Examiner. Our
condolences go to Norma, Susan, Malcolm and family.
It is with sadness that the passing on of one of our longest serving members
Lincoln King ZS2BZ in King Williams Town on the evening of 25-06-2001 at the
age of almost 88 years is announced. He was a member of the SARL since 1932
with callsign ZT2F. He was chairman of the Kaffrarian branch for more than
30 years. The Border Radio club honoured him by making him an Honorary Life
Member in recognition of his service to his fellow Amateurs in the Border
Area as well as to ham radio nationally. At the last Club General Meeting it
was decided unanimously to honour him again by elevating him to Honorary Life
President of the Branch at our forthcoming Branch AGM. Regrettably he was
unaware of that decision. Lincoln's lifemate Stella predeceased him in 1987.
Lincoln is survived by his son Bev and two daughters Ollie & Ray. He also
leaves six grandchildren and ten great grandchildren. We extend our sympathy
to them all in their sad loss.
PAUSE
Here are the headlines of today's news:
MUCH WORK NEEDED TO SECURE MORE SPECTRUM AT 7 MHZ
SARL TO REACH OUT TO AFRICA
TEACHERS COURSE START MONDAY
AMATEUR RADIO RENAISSANCE
RAE MANUAL FOR THE BLIND
WEST RAND ELECTS NEW COMMITTEE
PROPAGATION REPORT
You are listening to ZS6SRL. The news follows in detail
MUCH WORK NEEDED TO SECURE MORE SPECTRUM AT 7 MHZ
The discussion during the SARL Intecnet of 24 June 2001 focused on the
expansion of the 40 metreband to a world- wide allocation of 300 kHz,
preferably 7000 to 7300 kHz. The proposal is on the ITU WRC agenda for 2003.
The IARU has produced a booklet motivating the proposal. A copy is available
on the IARU Region webpages at www.iaru-r1.org.
Much work is to be done to lobby the South African administration and the
administrations of every African member country of the ITU. One of the main
concerns arising from the Intecnet discussions was that mainstream
politicians and the media in Africa have very little understanding of Amateur
Radio and the benefits it offers to communities at large. The main comment
was that Amateur Radio needs more media coverage.
The SARL has the mechanism to achieve this if details of events that are
newsworthy are communicated prior to the event . This will allow for the
preparation and release of a media statement.
Recently the SARL has created a committee for the protection of the amateur
service (CPAS) and has invited clubs in all provinces to nominate at least
one person to serve on the committee. Except for KwaZulu-Natal no
nominations have been received.
Several participants in the Intecnet discussion proposed that the SARL
prepare a media publicity guideline, a challenge that was accepted by the
SARL and is currently being worked on. The guide to better media relations
for Amateur Radio will be available by mid July.
News items and pictures for media releases and magazine articles should be
sent by Email to
[email protected] or by fax to 012 991 5651. Send a SMS to
082 553 4539 to alert that a newsworthy story is being emailed. All that is
required for a media release is all the facts and a contact number. A
fleamarket is not a good subject for a media statement but an emergency
event, communications at a national sporting event, a new RAE course and an
interesting lecture are suitable
The next Intecnet will be held on July 29 with the speaker Paul Schuch on the
popular subject of SETI, the search for extra-terrestrial intelligence.
SARL TO REACH OUT TO AFRICA
The SARL is reaching out to Africa to assist in developing an active amateur
radio service in countries on the African continent.
There are less than 10 000 radio amateurs in Africa of which over 50% are in
South Africa. In Japan there are over 1 million and in the USA almost 750
000. These figures clearly show that there is a correlation between the size
and development of the electronics industry and the number of radio amateurs.
Africa has much to gain from Amateur Radio particularly if its development is
focused on the youth.
In conjunction with the International Amateur Radio Union (IARU) the South
African Radio League (SARL) will be holding a one day workshop on the eve of
the ITU Telecom Africa 2001 which will be hosted by South Africa in
Johannesburg from 12 - 16 November 2001.
The workshop "Amateur Radio for Africa" will be held on Saturday 10 November
at the National Amateur Radio Centre in Roodepoort (near Johannesburg). The
workshop will provide delegates with information and guidelines on how to
develop the Amateur Service in their country and how to introduce Amateur
Radio into schools.
The International Amateur Radio Union will be exhibiting at Africa Telecom
showing the value that Amateur Radio can bring to the developing world.
"Amateur Radio for Africa" is so arranged that delegates to Africa Telecom
2001 will be able to include the workshop in their itinerary.
TEACHERS COURSE START MONDAY
From Monday 2 July 15 teachers will be attending the RAE course at the
National Amateur Radio Centre. The course is part of the SARL ARISAS
programme aimed at educating the educators. Look out on the bands this week
as the new recruits are being taken through on-the-air operating skills
practice.
AMATEUR RADIO RENAISSANCE
Mike Bosch ZS2FM reports that he has already received a number of letters
from Divisions 1, 2 and 6 with reference to his survey into the low level of
membership of the SARL. These letters are very illuminating and a definite
pattern of reasons seems to be emerging.
However, Mike would like to hear from more members and non- members alike,
right across the country, with the reasons why they have not joined the
League or why they have let their membership lapse. He would like to have
the reports before the end of July.
If you have amateur radio at heart , this is your opportunity to help
revitalize it. Please write to ZS2FM, PO Box 1614, Port Elizabeth 6000.
Your identity will be kept confidential unless you specifically give
permission to make it known.
RAE MANUAL FOR THE BLIND
Rudi, ZS6DX, has approached the Port Elizabeth Amateur Radio Society (PEARS)
with the suggestion that he be allowed to transcribe the PEARS RAE manual,
which has now been adopted as the official RAE manual, onto tape for use by
blind candidates. PEARS has readily agreed to this request, and the tapes
will be provided free of charge under the auspices of Tape Aids For The
Blind.. OM Rudi is to be commended for providing this service.
WEST RAND ELECTS NEW COMMITTEE
At the West Rand Amateur Radio Club AGM held on 23 June 2001 Bill van Zyl was
for the third year running elected as chairman. Vice-chairman: John Brock
ZS6BZF Secretary/Treasurer: Dave Cloete ZR6AOC
PROPAGATION REPORT
Ean Retief, ZS1PR reports as follows:
The Solar Flux declined fairly quickly during the past week, falling with as
much as 20 points per day. The X-ray emission from the Sun stayed high until
Thursday when it fell below C-class background value for the first time since
before last weekend.
At the start of the week there were four major flares but no major effects
was felt and the Geomagnetic Field were mostly quiet.
It is expected that the Solar Flux will go down to around 130 today and it
should hopefully start to rise in the coming week. No major effects or
occurrences are expected.
The 10-metre band will be poor, but openings are possible eastwards between
09:00 and 16:00, with openings between ZS and the Middle East between 10:00
and 13:30, but will be fairly weak. Openings into central Europe should
occur between 11:30 and 17:30. Skip will be long on 20 metres, especially in
the mornings and evenings.
The 15 and 17-metre bands should be a far better possibility for DX. Not
long after sunset 20 metres and higher should be quite dead, but with the low
expected Geomagnetic activity the bands from 30 to 160 metres will be fairly
quiet and offer good potential.
CLUB ACTIVITIES
The Bloemfontein ARC is holding a sherry and soup evening on Friday 13 July
2001 at the SA Armour Museum in the Tempe Military Base. A visit will be
made to the training simulators and the film 'Frequency' will be screened.
Contact Barney ZS4AQZ at 083 462 7507 or Dennis ZS4BS at 082 770 9126 for
more information.
The West rand Radio Club will have a boot sale on Saturday 28 July 2001 at
the clubhouse in Kroton Ave, Weltevrden Park. Take note that the starting
time will be 12 noon when the gates will open. The starting time 12 noon
specifically targets those amateurs who normally works Saturday mornings.
For enquiries phone Bill van Zyl at 011 726-6807
The SARL News Service invites Clubs and individuals to contribute information
regarding Amateur Radio to
[email protected] with a copy to
[email protected]. It will be highly appreciated if it is done in
Afrikaans as well as English and send it as early in the week as possible.
Also join us in the following activities:
The President's Net on Sundays 12:00 on 7082 kHz.
Amateur Radio Mirror International Sundays at 10:00 on 9750 and 21560 kHz
which are sponsored by Sentech, the common carrier for broadcasting signals
in South Africa and Telkom who provides the transmission lines. This
transmission is repeated Mondays at 20:00 on 3215 kHz. Several relays on 2 m
and 70 cm also take place in your area.
Correspondence for Amateur Radio Mirror International is via
[email protected]. Include your telephone number to allow the producers to
call you for a possible interview.
Send written reports to P O Box 90438 Garsfontein 0042 and include a
self-addressed envelope and sufficient postage so that you may receive a QSL
card.
We thank all contributors, individuals, clubs and other organisations to this
bulletin and all stations who so reliably relay these bulletins. This
bulletin was compiled by By Marten, ZS6ZY and read
by..........from...........
You have been listening to ZS6SRL.
This bulletin now ends and Sarlnews wishes you a pleasant week.
Goodbye to all.
/ex
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Internet feed from ZS6ZY moved by Richard de ZR6CK
Regards,
Richard.
--- Msged/Q 1.60
* Origin: QTHR KG44DG, Novell User Group, Pretoria, RSA (5:7106/22)
