VK5CE/4 DXpedition to OC-255

Red Island is in site – literally!

This afternoon I flew into Bamaga where I met up with one of my support people who took me 8km north to the coastal location of Seisia. It’s so exciting to be in far north Queensland again in such a remote location. Seisia will be my mainland staging base and supply town. Fingers crossed that all of the equipment has survived the freight and flights and is in working order.

I have just a little bit of mobile phone and internet coverage on the beach in Seisia which means I can give you my latest update before departing for the island in the morning. As I write this it’s 7:30pm local time. Tomorrow is going to be a big day to set up the camp on this uninhabited island. In the morning I’ll get fuel, food and water to keep me alive and sustained. The threat of crocodiles is something I’ll need to take seriously and I’ll be trying to get the antennas as close to the water’s edge as possible while trying to have the tent as far away as possible.

People need to remember that there’ll be times that I need to go off the air for 15-30 minutes to work on the generator or to repair the tent during a storm. There may be times of the day that I won’t be on air in case of bad weather (especially electrical storms) or if the supply boat comes to bring me fuel, water and ice.

I’m really hoping that I have internet mobile coverage somewhere on the island not too far from the campsite, I’ve been told this be possible if I’m lucky. If I don’t, then each day at noon I may arrange for my support guy to pick me up from the island, go to Seisia, get more ice, fuel, etc supplies and bring my laptop to upload files onto ClubLog to avoid people doing dupes. Only time will tell what’ll I’ll end up doin. There are so many variables and potential things to go wrong on this DXpedition – so fingers crossed!

Looking at the tiny island from the mainland it has a surprisingly large hill on it and so I need to carefully pick my spot to avoid signals being blocked. We’re probably going to land and set up camp on the northern side so that’ll provide a clear water short path to JA, W/VE and Europe. It may not great for long path Europe but don’t worry guys because here in the tropics the best European path is 15m and 20m short path especially at this time of the year. This is opposite to my OC-261 DXpedition in southern Australia where long path 20m was ideal and short path was almost non-existent. If I find a good spot with clear water short path then it will allow me to look for JA and W/VE on 15m in my mornings at 2100-0200 UTC, visit the mainland, return as quickly as possible around 0400/0500 UTC to try for 20m for long path Europe and short path west coast W/VE and South America. Then it’s the long shift from around 0800 UTC working 15m JA/Europe and venturing to 20m by 1000 UTC to look for short path W/VE coast to coast and then Europeans will start arriving around 1200 UTC. Remember Europe to stand by for North America in the 1000-1400 UTC period when I ask, but don’t worry as 20m to Europe should be open past 1600 UTC if conditions are good.

Who knows, we’ll just have to see what ionospheric and environmental conditions throw at us in this wild adventure over the next 6 days.

Currently in Cairns, north Queensland

Hey all you funky island chasers out there.

Today I flew from Adelaide (VK5) to Sydney (VK2) and then Sydney (VK2) to Cairns (VK4) in north Queensland. Tomorrow I fly from Cairns to Bamaga in far far far far north Queensland.

Cairns airport involved a little drama this afternoon as the airline misplaced the box with the 2 x 12m Spiderbeam fibreglass poles. No poles = NO antennas. Fortunately they eventually turned up.

So this evening I’m in beautiful tropical north Queensland. Around 5pm I walked along the esplanade in Cairns and the weather is a real shock to the system as it’s hot and really humid in the tropics and Red Island is further north so it’ll be even more humid. But hey what’s a wild tropical adventure without some adversity.

I’m staying at the same hotel tonight that Michelle my wife and I stayed at the night before doing the Fitzroy Island OC-172 VK4LDX/P DXpedition in October 2010. So it’s nice to be here again exactly three years later to get ready for this IOTA DXpedition. I’m trying to enjoy the luxuries of life right now to prepare myself for 5 nights on an uninhabited island in the tropics by myself with no resources. So it’s been an enjoyable night of beer, beer, beef, beer and beer at the Steak on the Lake anti-vegetarian establishment, it’s so hot and humid dining outside that you need to drink quickly before your beer gets warm 🙂

OK now to business. On Wednesday I’ll be on the island and I think it’ll take all day to go there and set up camp. I need to take my time so that the tent and antennas can survive rain and wind and thunderstorms that are likely to visit me, nothing worse than tent repairs at 200am in the morning during a storm. So don’t expect me on the air early on Wednesday October 15, the goal is to be operational by sunset which is 0800 UTC. To give people the best chance of working me, I’m only going to operate on 2 bands and I’ll focus on 20m as much as I can. I’ll only go to 15m when 20m is not productive.

Antennas will again be a 15m and 20m vertical dipole at the high tide mark – the 20m vertical dipole was incredible for North America at the VK5CE/P OC-261 DXpedition in August and Red Island will be a MUCH better location. Frequencies will be 14260 and 21260 +/- interference and listening up 5.

After having done DXpeditions to other northern Australian IOTAs of OC-171, OC-172, OC-138 and OC-185 I know what the band conditions will be like. I would say that my operating will be as follows:

0000-0200 on 15m (10:00am-12:00pm)
0200-0400 maintaining antenna/generator/campsite/mealtime and doing club log (12:00pm-2:00pm)
0400-0800 on 20m (2:00pm-6:00pm)
0800-0900 meal break and generator re-fill (6:00pm-7:00pm)
0900-1600 on 20m (7:00pm-2:00am)
16:00-2100 sleep (2:00am-7:00am)
21:00-0000 on 15m (7:00am-10:00)

this is my preferred scheduled to give east coast north America and Europe on 20m and JA and west coast North America on 15m the best chance to get in the log. In the 0400-1400 UTC period I will only go on 15m if 20m is dead.

Freight logistics on track

Hi everyone

It’s only a few weeks to go. There are many logistics involved with this DXpedition as I need to organise not only the radio equipment but also all aspects of life support. Red Island is totally uninhabited and so everything from food, water, medical, generator, fuel, shelter, etc also needs to be arranged.

Much of the equipment has arrived in Bamaga in far north Queensland including the amplifier, amp power supply and generator. There are just a couple more boxes to express freight up there.

I’ve arranged with the two air lines I’m flying with to take extra baggage, in particular the Spiderbeam poles for the 20m and 15m vertical dipoles.

73s de Craig VK5CE

Next IOTA DXpedition announced – October 16-21

For all of my previous IOTA DXpeditions there have been some inhabitants or facilities on the island. For instance Magnetic Island was a popular tourist island with a daily ferry service, Fitzroy Island had a resort on it with an almost daily Fast Catamaran service and Horn Island had a pub and motel with a daily flight there. Then I started to get a little more adventurous, Bremer Island had accommodation there but it needed a charter boat for the visit and Flinders Island also had accommodation but it needed a single engine charter plane to get there.

It was time to draw inspiration from my collection of DXpedition DVDs by K4UEE and 9V1YC, etc and go somewhere that was totally uninhabited, that was in a very remote part of Australia and was in high demand and hadn’t been activated for a long time. OC-255 fitted these criteria. Red Island is totally uninhabited, is off the far north tip of Queensland, is claimed by only 15.4% of IOTA claimants and was only ever activated once for four days back in 2002.

Originally the VK5CE/P OC-261 Flinders Island trip was going to be my only DXpedition of 2013. However I’d been planning the logistics of visiting OC-255 for a while and so when the opportunity came to do this, the planning and research had already been done. I had to do this planning in secret from my lovely XYL as I figured there was only a 1 in a 100 chance of doing this IOTA DXpedition – she’s understanding, but not THAT understanding. Once she agreed for me to go to OC-255 she realised there had been a conspiracy all year to try and make 2 DXpeditions a reality in 2013 J

The journey to get to this island is a long one from my home in Middleton, South Australia. It requires two flights totalling 4400 km or a bit over 7000 miles from Adelaide to Cairns and then Cairns to Bamaga. From Bamaga I’ll have a local 4WD and fishing boat operator act as my DXpedition support person. He will pick me up from the Bamaga air strip, take me to the island, help me set up the tent and antenna and every couple of days he’ll visit the island with fuel and water and just to make sure I’m safe.

There’s an air of excitement about being on my rarest IOTA yet especially as it is on a deserted island, while at the same time there’s a feeling of nervousness as this is the first trip where I’ve really had to take safety and life support into consideration.

The cost of this DXpedition will be high and so the support of sponsors is really appreciated. If you work me as VK5CE/P on Flinders Island in August, please note that all donations will be used to fund this IOTA DXpedition to Red Island.