Having returned from 9M a week ago I have only just got round to reading
some of the Reflector stuff that happened while I was away.
I see we came in for some flak from various people regarding our decision
not to participate in the ARRL CW Contest.
Firstly, let me make it clear - we did NOT ask people to keep a band of
frequencies clear on 160 that weekend. That request came specifically from
Bill W4ZV on behalf of the topband fraternity. Rather, we indicated that we
would focus on RTTY, SSB, the WARC bands.
The rationale is simple - we had already been on the air for over a week,
including one weekend, with about 50k QSOs in the log. So there was a high
probability that, by operating the contest, we would end up working a bunch
of the same people over again on the same bands and modes. We preferred to
hand 9M0C to a few thousand more who still needed us, rather than push up
our QSO total for the sake of it. As a contest mult. 9M0 is no more big
deal than, say GW, so the contesters didn't really lose out. If you wanted
to work us that weekend, we were certainly around in a big way on the other
bands and modes. But I did take exception to some practices. At one stage I
was operating 9M0C on 15 SSB and QSYed to 15 CW to oblige some JA stations
with a CW QSO, and was pounced on by a W6 who called repeatedly. I called
"QRZ no ARRL contest" two or three times and the guy kept calling, so I
assumed he genuinely wanted this for a new one, gave 599 report, and got
back "599CA, ur power please". When I refused to play, another, even
louder, N6 landed on me and quite deliberately started calling CQ contest
on top. This was an N6 who we had worked on 160 a couple of nights before,
presumably for a new one. That's what I call gratitude ...
One suggestion was that our decision not to participate in the contest was
based on a wish to collect more $. I'll treat that with the contempt it
desrves.
I have posted a summary of our activities elsewhere (to the various DX
bulletins, etc.). Suffice to say that we made over 65.5k QSOs (4th highest
DXpedition total ever), so we were pretty active all bands and modes. If
you needed us, you could almost certainly have worked us.
73 Don G3XTT
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