Mayersville MS
Frank Loesser’s 1944 song, Baby, It’s Cold Outside, was number one on the Hit Parade in Mayersville, MS during last Saturday’s Mississippi QSO Party. We were guests of Mayor Shorter and permitted to use Russell Park there for our planned morning outing to activate the rare Issaquena County. I had organized the first outing for the Fox Mike Hotel Portable Ops Team with Thomas Gandy N5WDG, Glen Popiel KW5GP, Teri Bloom AC5YL, and Mike Duke K5XU. We were excited for the couple of weeks before the event to get out and operate, assembling an official planning document with who’s on first, etc. It proved to be a good exercise, thwarted primarily by unexpected turns in the weather, all clouded what proved to be poor propagation.
I had done a site visit two weeks prior searching for places with electricity and bathroom access, preferable with tall, tall trees from which to hand wire antennas. My first spot, Chotard Landing, a fishing “resort” with cabin rentals, could not actually be reached by automobile (even in my 4WD Chevy Silverado) since the Lower Delta was flooded. Combines and other barriers blocked roads emanating from Highway 61 (roadway of the Blues) north of Vicksburg that headed west toward the river. I finally called Chotard Landing to hear a recording that they were closed until further notice because they were flooded out. Hmm. A call could’ve saved an hour. But it was a site to see a dozen or so farm implement shelters halfway or more under water. Mayersville is the county seat of Issaquena County, the largest town at about 650 people in 2013, and the recommendation of Malcolm Keown W5XX, ARRL Section Director and well-known DXer. So, the Mayor’s consent was easily obtained and her husband is the EMA Director so he got the bathroom opened and made sure the electricity at the baseball field was active for us.
Mike K5XU
We set up under a permanent open picnic canopy with picnic tables. It took about 45 minutes for us to react to the aftermath of the cold front that came early across the Mississippi River the night before. It was 38 degrees with wind gusts of 20 mph or so. (OK, that’s not cold if you live in Michigan but here it is.) My team was somewhat taken aback but we packed a propane heater in case it was “cold” in the early morning. What an under-estimate! The wind kept the heater blown out as quick as we could light it. The trees were sparse but we packed a Buddipole dipole (Popiel) and an MFJ Big Stick (Howell) in addition to an MFJ End-Fed Half-Wave (MFJ 1982HP). The end-fed was attached over the top of a 50′ tree on one end (sling-shot golf ball launcher) and the end of the canopy on the other end, about 8′ high. A random counterpoise wire was attached to the EFHW. That’ll be tuned better for the next outing but this antenna worked well. The Buddipole did not. Glen KW5GP had just purchased it and it tuned up well using an antenna analyzer. But Glen went bust using it on his Yaesu FT-450 rig box (see the box build featured in QST.
I brought my FT-450D housed in an intentionally inexpensive plastic storage tub from Walmart. Mike Duke K5XU brought his “talking” Kenwood 570 and CW keyer. Mike has been blind since birth but is extremely proficient in operating his rigs, whether at his home QTH or in a portable location such as this. He worked ARRL Editor Mark Wilson K1RO and others from each Coast. We swapped the Big Stick vertical between Mike’s KW 570 and my FT-450D as we tried to ride the expected 80M to 40M to 20M propagation. But, decent propagation was not to be that day. Glen found 40M almost co
Thomas N5WDG
mpletely dead using the Buddipole configured as a dipole about 8′ above ground. The Big Stick vertical with four counterpoise wires did ok, especially on CW, but the MFJ EFHW did the best. If you want to call our total score, best! We barely broke 1,000 total points. But, as the team members have said, future activations in various locations are to be scheduled when schedules permit. Fine Business!
Here is a brief video clip of my team who just got a bad case of the shivers, hand wiggling, and really wanting to get back in the truck where a heater would “stay lit.” At 1pm, we called it a day and abandoned our planning afternoon activation of Sharkey County MS in Rolling Fork. We were to have also been the guests of the Mayor of that city at their Visitors Center. They have tall oaks in the back of the Center….and inside accommodations. I’ll plan another outing for the Fox Mike Hotel Portable Ops Team in the near future for the also rare Sharkey County and will announce on this blog. The Issaquena site at Chotard Landing, once the flood recedes and they get back into operation, is also planned for getting that “no hams live here” county. Stay tuned.