Got to visit Steve Jonas today

I got to visit Steve-K4SDJ for about an hour today. Sure was good to see him and spend some time catching up on things. He's in the rehab center and is making good progress. The doc says he should go home on Sept 6th.

Space Shuttle Discovery Launch

Stayed up to follow the launch of the Space Shuttle Discovery last night at 11:59 est. Watched NASA TV on the web while listening to the Solid Rocket Booster Recovery team on 7.833 Mhz. The Echolink feed of the shuttle audio was not working last night so Dan-KF4MND pointed his node to the 147.330 repeater so that we could all follow things on our radios. Had quite a few operators positioned around town to monitor the comm and view the launch. I monitored from the QTH here in Sandfly and was able to hear some of the air to ground transmissions. Mac-KF4LMT monitored from his QTH near Bacon Park and was able to copy all of the air to ground transmissions from his monitoring post. Kevin was out on Tybee Island with his astronomy club and was able to observe the shuttle as it ascended up the east coast. Paul-KJ4FAV was at Fort Pulaski and also had a good view. Bob-W4WTO was on Wilmington Island and also observed the launch. Dan-KF4MND also saw the launch and copied the air to ground from all the way inland in Long County. Interesting note......three of the astronauts on Discovery are HAMs.

K4GIV Homebrew Slim Jim Antenna

One of our local operators, Tom-K4GIV, just completed a very nice antenna project. He build a 2 meter Slim Jim antenna to work all the local repeaters as well as simplex. His initial reports have been good. Tom is going to write a summary for an upcoming club newsletter. Folks, this is one of my favorite aspects of the hobby. Great job Tom.

Tested the Memorial Medical Center Station Today

After breakfast with the guys this morning I went over and tested the Amateur Radio Station K4MUM at Memorial Medical Center. I met Carl-KC4UHM in the radio room and we got the station connected and fired up. Got good comm checks on 146.970 with KG6MUQ and AJ4MY and then on 442.700 with KA4CID. Also tuned up the primary Georgia ARES freq of 3.975 Mhz and got a good check with another Georgia station up near Lake Sinclair. Packed everything up and put it away till next time. Next time we hope to get the 1.2 Ghz D-Star radio up and running.