Field Day 2023

K6AAN – Mike Dugger – President

Field Day 2023 turned out to be a great event thanks to all the help received from our membership. It takes a team to plan and run a successful operation and the subsequent success reflects on all of us that participated.

We were fortunate to have the Thompson Ranch as the venue with all the great amenities, shade, and support of the owner Craig Thompson. I spent the better part of three days at the site and enjoyed plenty of assistance and support from many of our members. I was extremely proud of all the work and effort everyone put in.

Setup of antennas went smoothly. All the end fed antennas used for the operation were built by our Treasurer Mike Zane and performed very well. The antenna launcher recently donated to the club by Gary Gagliano really came in handy on one particularly tough shot over a tree limb! Reliable, all day battery power units to run the radios were provided by Ron Simpson and Tom Daly. These kept everything running strong all day. Three of our club-owned radios were used and were kept busy by many of our members throughout the day on Sat.

The focus of our operation towards getting new hams on HF radio came through with flying colors. I saw several operators getting on the HF bands for the first time and big smiles on their faces while doing so. We also had two new hams come to the event with questions and radios that they needed help with. That assistance was provided promptly and with personal attention.

Two former members rejoined the club during the operation. Welcome back Roger Gearhart and Jason Pritchard! Many folks left the site with some very nice prizes they won in the drawing we had after dinner. We continue to thank Paula Shephard and Nancy Robertson for their generous donation of prize items.

Band conditions were not the greatest and we were not pushing to collect a high score. The review of the station logs was: SSB phone contacts – 52, CW- 39, sections worked- 32, Canada – 2. The new people that got on HF, the third-party radio ops, VE testing, and Elmering provided to those who needed help were way more important than an obscure fine print score listing in QST magazine. I am very grateful for all the hard work everyone did to make our Field Day 2023 the fun event that it was.