Subj : Amateur Radio Newsline (C) To : All From : Daryl Stout Date : Fri Feb 26 2021 10:14:26 TOWERING VICTORY FOR VERMONT AMATEUR DON/ANCHOR: A New England ham's battle to put up radio towers is over and at last, he can start construction. Kent Peterson, KC0DGY, tells us what it took for him to win his case. KENT: Zach Manganello, K1ZK, may well consider himself the recipient of a towering victory in every sense of those words. The longtime amateur spent the greater part of 2020 defending his proposal to install two radio towers on his property the rural part of Vermont. Last summer, neighbors objected to his original proposal for the 84-foot towers saying they were too high and were damaging to their views. Zach downsized his plans and tried again. He even conducted visual impact tests floating a balloon to simulate the height of the tower to ensure neighbors' views would remain unaffected. This month, the Telecommunications Review Board of the Town of Shelburne granted Zach the right to go ahead with two towers, one at 40 feet and the other 60 feet, both supported by guy wires. According to a report in the Burlington Free Press, the local board decided to give its support to Zach's tower project after being convinced that having backup emergency communications in the neighborhood was a local asset. The report said the panel was impressed as well by Zach's willingness to share the educational aspects of amateur radio with the greater community. All of this came as the hoped-for good news for Zach, a lifelong radio enthusiast since his childhood in Maine and a ham since the age of 14. For Amateur Radio Newsline, I'm Kent Peterson, KC0DGY. (BURLINGTON FREE PRESS) ** BREAK HERE: Time for you to identify your station. We are the Amateur Radio Newsline, heard on bulletin stations around the world, including the WD8IIJ repeater of the Steubenville-Weirton Amateur Radio Club on Fridays at 8 p.m. local time in the hometown of the late great Dean Martin, Stuebenville, Ohio. ** PROFESSIONAL RECOGNITION FOR HAMSCI SPACE WEATHER PROJECT DON/ANCHOR: The space weather project launched by the HamSCI collective has been getting some pretty prominent notice. Andy Morrison, K9AWM, is here with the details. ANDY: Amateur radio's volunteer space weather watchers have been getting some recognition from the pros lately. A February 9th article in "Eos: Earth & Space Science News" gives a respectful nod to the space weather sensor network created worldwide by Ham Radio Science Citizen Investigation, or HamSCI, a collective created by Nathaniel Frissell, W2NAF. The article praises the crowdsourced data hams are able to collect from radio signals as those signals are influenced by changes in ionospheric propagation. It was co-written by Nathaniel along with David Kazdan, AD8Y, and Kristina Collins, both of Case Western Reserve University, W8EDU. Eos is a publication of the American Geophysical Union. The authors discuss how hams monitor what responses the Earth's atmosphere has to different solar activity and the activity's impact on telecommunications and electrical utilities, among other things. The article advocates increased reliance on what hams and their amateur stations can offer. [quote] They write: "With open-source instrumentation cheaper and more plentiful than ever before, the time is ripe for amateur scientists to take distributed measurements of the ionosphere — and the amateur radio community is up for the challenge.” [end quote] With support from the National Science Foundation, HamSCI has launched a Personal Space Weather Station project to support hams who wish to collect such data to be used in space science research. Publication of the article comes just weeks before HamSCI's virtual workshop which is being held on March 19th and 20th. For Amateur Radio Newsline, I'm Andy Morrison, K9AWM. (EOS: EARTH & SPACE SCIENCE NEWS) ** YOUTH ON THE AIR CAMP BEGINS PRIORITY REGISTRATION DON/ANCHOR: If you know a young radio amateur who can't wait for camp season, Jack Parker, W8ISH, has some good news for you. JACK: Organizers have reaffirmed their commitment to hosting this year's Youth on the Air camp, even as campers from across the Americas who were accepted into last year's cancelled camp are completing priority registration now. The camp is scheduled to be open in Ohio from July 11th to the 16th with COVID-19 safety restrictions in place. Camp director Neil Rapp, WB9VPG, said in an announcement that a final decision will be made in April about whether the camp must be postponed for another year. In the meantime, applications will be accepted in March for any prospective campers who were not a part of last year's group. The camp will host a maximum of 30 youngsters. Neil wrote: [quote] "We are truly hopeful that we can proceed with the camp this summer. We have some exciting plans! We are also looking at an operating event in the summer. Stay tuned." [endquote] For Amateur Radio Newsline, I'm Jack Parker, W8ISH. (YOTA AMERICAS CAMP) --- SBBSecho 3.13-Win32 * Origin: The Thunderbolt BBS - tbolt.synchro.net (618:250/33) .