Not the Winter Field Day I Panned
As I mentioned in a earlier blog post, I decided to make the most out of Winter Field Day (WFD) this year. I even wrote down some objectives on a note card with a rough schedule for operating.
The plan was to set up my popup ice fishing shelter and operate QRP with my Icom 705 with the goal of operating for at least 6 hours and make 50 contacts. Knowing I'd have little chance calling CQ with 10 watt max, I was planning to do kind of an endurance test, mainly of my patiences.
However with it being -25 degrees F when I was getting my gear ready, I decided to not mess with a frozen mast and coax and operator from my truck. Afterall, that was why I spent the money for an ATAS antenna.
While it turned into a "park and bark" POTA activation, it was still good practice for an emergency, as is the intention of WFD.
If this was an actual emergency
While it is a fun thought of grabbing a go bag and radio and "go inna woods" during an emergency, that's really not a realistic situation. In reality, if there is a "grid down" situation, I'd likely still be operating from my home. Probably on battery power and backup heat in the winter, but still at home.
If there was a need to operate away from the home base, it would likely be from my truck. Operating with the 50 watt FTM-300 mobile rig for UHF & VHF and the 100 watt FT-891 paired with the ATAS-120 (or any other 50 watt dual band and 100 watt HF with a similar antenna) would be a setup hard to beat. All self contained in a mobile shelter with heat seems like the ideal emergency radio station location.
But with that said, I will get the fish shack radio station out and on the air at least a time or two this winter. Even if that wouldn't be a "practical" setup, it would be worth my time to get more practice in with a setup like that any way.... not to mention it is fun to do.
How WFD went for me
Overall I had a good time, and got some of my objectives accomplished. Plus I got my first Kilo award for POTA to boot. I made a point to try to make contacts on 2m and 6m, and I did fairly good a hunting down other POTA activators in a sea of contesters. All with temperatures less than -10F. Not a bad day.
