Subj : Amateur Radio Newsline (A)
To   : All
From : Daryl Stout
Date : Fri Sep 17 2021 03:56:34

Amateur Radio Newsline Report 2290 for Friday, September 17th, 2021

Amateur Radio Newsline Report Number 2290 with a release date of 
Friday, September 17th, 2021 to follow in 5-4-3-2-1.

The following is a QST. Tokyo's ham fair is cancelled because of 
COVID. A special event station marks a birthday for a Voice of 
America station -- and 1,000 new parks join the POTA program. All 
this and more, as Amateur Radio Newsline Report Number 2290 comes 
your way right now.

***

BILLBOARD CART

**

COVID SPURS CANCELLATION OF TOKYO HAM FAIR

NEIL/ANCHOR: Our top story this week is the cancellation of Tokyo 
Ham Fair 2021, the world's largest ham radio event. Yoshinori 
Takao, JG1KTC, chairman of the Japan Amateur Radio League, 
announced that JARL had been committed to holding the ham fair as 
planned on October 2nd and 3rd using extreme preventative measures 
against COVID-19 but new waves of infection made it necessary to 
call everything off. He expressed hope for better chances in 2022. 
The 2020 ham fair was also called off due to the pandemic. 
According to the JARL website, more than 42,000 people attended 
the fair in 2019 over the course of two days.

(JARL)

**

IARU REGION 3 OPTS FOR VIRTUAL CONFERENCE

NEIL/ANCHOR: The IARU Region 3 is also responding to the pandemic
—by holding its first digital regional conference. Jason Daniels, 
VK2LAW, brings us that story.

JASON: The IARU Region 3 Conference kicks off on September 20th 
and for its hosting organisation, RAST, it was supposed to be 
three days of business and fellowship in Bangkok, Thailand. It 
will instead be held digitally: a first for Region 3, but a 
necessary response to the extraordinary circumstances of the 
COVID-19 pandemic. RAST's president, Jack Hantongkom, HS1FVL, 
writes on the conference website: [quote] "We are excited about 
the opportunities of holding an innovative virtual conference." 
[endquote] As such, the member societies will still meet in 
working groups to deal with technical, operational and policy 
matters, typical of any such conference except that this, the 18th 
regional conference, will take place on the Zoom platform. The 
tentative list of participants on the conference website includes 
attendees from ORARI, the Indonesian amateur radio society; the 
Chinese Taipei Amateur Radio League; the Chinese Radio Amateurs 
Club; the American Radio Relay League and the Malaysian Amateur 
Radio Transmitters Society, among others. Jack writes further: 
[quote] "This conference will bring us together at what is a very 
difficult time for us all. " [endquote]

For full details of the conference go to the URL given in this 
weeks script at arnewsline.org

For Amateur Radio Newsline, I'm Jason Daniels, VK2LAW.

[FOR PRINT ONLY, DO NOT READ: https://www.iarur3conf2021.org/ ]

(IARU REGION 3)

**

AMSAT SYMPOSIUM MOVES FROM HOTEL INTO VIRTUAL MODE

NEIL/ANCHOR: Meanwhile, in the US, AMSAT has also announced a 
change in plans for its 2021 Space Symposium and Annual Meeting. 
Originally scheduled to take place at the Crowne Plaza hotel in 
Bloomington, Minnesota, it will instead be held on Zoom on 
Saturday, October 30th from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Central Time. The 
program will be a mix of live Q&A sessions and pre-recorded video 
segments. Registration is required through the AMSAT member 
portal. AMSAT plans to make the event available for public viewing 
later on its YouTube channel. AMSAT announced the changes, citing 
concerns about safety during the COVID-19 pandemic.

(AMSAT)

**

SPACEX RECOVERY VESSELS NAMED FOR 'BOB AND DOUG'

NEIL/ANCHOR: Remember Bob and Doug? No, not the fictional McKenzie 
brothers, but the NASA astronauts. SpaceX is remembering them and 
Paul Braun, WD9GCO, tells us how.

PAUL: In August of 2020, Bob Behnken, KE5GGX, and Doug Hurley,
became the first astronauts launched aboard a crew Dragon 
spacecraft in a historic commercial flight. This year, Bob and 
Doug were to play key roles in the splash-down stage of another 
history-making mission called Inspiration4. Well....at least their 
namesakes were ready: Two vessels in SpaceX's recovery fleet 
were named for the pair, in a nod to last year's mission which 
helped signal a new era in spaceflight. The ships bearing their 
names became part of the recovery fleet for Inspiration4, which 
-- with a crew of four private citizens aboard -- marked the 
world's first all-civilian space flight.

For Amateur Radio Newsline, I'm Paul Braun, WD9GCO.

(NASA, SPACE.COM)
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