Greetings fellow amateurs,
I am the National Manager of the Australian (VK) QSL Bureau, and write to seek your assistance in publicising to your country’s amateurs, problems that are experienced by sending QSL cards to the VK Bureau for VK9 and VK0 callsigns.
VK9 and VK0 represent a number of territories of Australia, and in fact, all eight (8) of these Territories are listed within the Clublog 100 most wanted DXCC. Accordingly, these Territories are frequently used as locations for DXpeditions (during 2018, there will be seven different DXpeditions to VK9 alone).
In almost all cases, these DXpeditions are managed by amateurs from countries other than Australia, however because of the VK9 or VK0 prefix, it is incorrectly assumed that QSL cards should be sent to the VK Bureau.
This creates a very heavy workload on the VK Bureau, which has to first seek where the QSL manager is located, and then sort, and re-direct those QSLs to a different DX Bureau. Having to re-direct so many cards incurs costs that we can longer absorb, and so the VK Bureau has taken the decision that we will no longer be re-directing QSL cards for VK9 and VK0, and nor will we be returning those cards marked as undeliverable.
This puts the onus back on your country’s amateurs to correctly identify the QSL process for these callsigns; in almost every case, this can be readily found from www.QRZ.com or other internet links. In many cases, such DXpeditions urge the use of OQRS as they do not wish to receive QSL cards. It is quite clear from the number of cards we receive, that many amateurs never look up QRZ.com to determine the correct path for VK9 and VK0 callsigns, thus leading to the problems we experience.
Therefore, it would be appreciated, if you could publicise this matter to your country’s amateurs, requesting that in all cases, before they send their QSL cards to the VK Bureau, that they identify the correct path for routing of QSL cards to VK9 and VK0 callsigns. If they do not do this, in all likelihood their card will never be answered, and nor will it be returned as undeliverable.
Any assistance that you can provide in advising your country’s amateurs of this matter would be greatly appreciated.
With best 73s
John Seamons
(VK3JLS)
National and Inwards QSL Bureau Manager for VK

Olivier ON4EI, is back again in Ireland from 18th to 28th March 2018 to operate EI8GQB. Thanks to the Tipperary radio club, he will use EI7T, the club vanity call, during the CQ WPX SSB contest as the Irish Commission of Regulation does not allow any more individual to use vanity calls for contest. EI1A has not be renewed to him.
Olivier is running contests in Low Power/Single Op SSB category using mainly green energy with his temporary 'Field Day like' antenna park setup.
 Inverted L 16m V/24m H monopole for 160 & 80m + 32 radials.
Inverted V dipole for 160-80m-40m bands.
80m long beverage RX antenna East-West directional.
Spiderbeam & Mosley TA33Jr antennas for 20/15/10m bands.
Transceivers: 2 x Elecraft K3 + P3 SO2R 100W.
500Ah battery bank + 180W solar panel and 400W wind generator.
You can follow this one-man expedition on qrz.com or meet him on the air.
For these dates, please QSL EI7T only via LOTW or EI8GQB via LOTW or QSL MANAGER: PA3249 (direct or bureau).

  OR4ESA is the temporary special callsign for the activation at the  European Space Agency (ESA) - Redu Site and Satellite Tracking Station in Redu, Belgium.  (Grid locator: JO20na)
      

We will be on the air only from the 17th of January until the 6th of February 2018.
The chief operator will be Javier Roldan EA1HEO.
The contacts will be valid for the ESA Amateur Radio Award (2 points per first QSO per mode and band).

QSL policy:
- Electronic QSL:
All the QSOs will be uploaded to LoTW, eQSL, Clublog, HRDLog and QRZ.com.
I prefer electronic QSLs as they are faster, cheaper, easier to archive and they are more friendly to the environment.
- Paper QSL:
I will also support paper QSL both via Bureau and Direct (in both cases via DL0ESA). (Thanks to DARC F42 Griesheim).
If direct, please include SASE (1 USD Europe, 2 USD outside Europe)).
Please note that we will only use paper QSL to reply to the paper QSLs we receive in Germany.
 
Working conditions:
- Antennas:
Homemade crossed dipoles with commecial balum for 40 & 80m mounted on a 25m metallic mast
Homemade vertical monopole with 4 elevated radials for 20m mounted on a 12m fiber telescopic mast
- Equipment:
Transceiver: Yaesu FT-817ND
Power Amplifier:  Microset 27-200T (aprox. 200W) + Filter for 20m
Power supply 30A
USB interface II for digital modes
Laptop Lenovo T400 for logging + digital modes (HRD + TM780). No internet.
 

Planned schedule:
I will try to be on the air daily (Monday to Friday) in the evening after work (19:00 - 22:00 UTC aprox) both in SSB and in digital modes. (Note: Digital modes will be mainly PSK31 and RTTY as QRP).
 
LOG analisys & statistics:
Below you can check if you are in our log. (I upload the QSOs typically the following morning after each operation)

Detailed SH5 overall activity statistics and world map of stations contacted and basic HRDlog overall activity statistics.