Had another great day at the Mighty Eighth Air Force Museum celebrating Veterans Day. Several of us met for breakfast at the Cracker Barrel before heading over to the museum to handle communications support for the 2nd Annual "Flying Fortress 5k" run. Steve-K4SDJ acted as our net control station and several other radio operators positioned along the race route to report position of lead and trail runners and to notify of any injuries or accidents. The race was a great success and the museum now has more funds to spend on restoring the B-17 "City of Savannah".
While the rest of the team was helping with the race I went ahead and started getting the radio compartment ready for our special event. Got the antennas connected, aircraft powered up, and radio equipment up and running. Also set up the webcam for the video feed so that folks could watch us across the Internet. Everything was working great and I was able to start making contacts on 20 meters well before 0900. Enjoyed making contacts with other hams all across the country and telling them about the B-17 restoration project.
When the race ended several of the hams that helped came inside and stuck around for a little while as well as many of the runners. This gave all of us a great opportunity to interact and explain to folks what we were doing in the the radio compartment. As usual we had the audio set up to be heard by everyone in the combat gallery. This really generates alot of interest around the aircraft.
As the day wore on I had some great opportunities to take several of my friends and thier families on tours of the aircraft. I'm getting pretty good at telling the "City of Savannah" story! And I love it. Right around noon Kevin-KW4B took over on the radio station so I could get a break. Right around that time my old Air Force buddy and former tech school instructor arrived at the museum. Tony flew in for the day from his home near Washington DC just to tour the museum and spend some time on the aircraft with us. It was great to grab some lunch with Tony and give him the grand tour of the aircraft and show off all the great things that the team has done over the last three years. Before you know it, it was time for Tony to head back to the airport. Sure was great to see him after all these years. He is a true patriot.
Kevin took off around that time too and I took over on the radio station again. Made several more contacts and just spent the rest of the time listing to some shortwave broadcasts on the 70 year old BC-348 Reciever. Boy that thing sure sounds good. I started shutting things down around 4:45 or so. Shut the radios down, turned the video feed off, killed the aircraft power, disconnected the battery charger, disconnected the external antennas, and packed up all my stuff. Basically ran the "post flight checklist".
Sure was a great day playing radio and celebrating Veterans Day. Looking forward to our next event.....perhaps Pearl Harbor Day?
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| Ahh...breakfast |
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| The race crew....Don-KK4AMD, Paul-KJ4FAV, Fred-KK4AMB, Mac-AF4KL, Irene-KF4RFF, Caleb, Lester-KF4JBQ, Steve-KD4HDQ, Ken-W4JKG, Peter-KJ4FAW, and taking the picture is Steve-K4SDJ |
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| Kevin-KW4B and the radio operator position |
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| My old Air Force buddy Tony in the radio compartment |
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| Tony at the radio operator position |
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| Tony and me in front of the "City of Savannah" |
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Laptop on the floor of the radio compartment providing video feed to the Internet
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