pSolar activity remains quiet, but on May 16 the daily sunspot number reached 212. I had to keep searching further and further back in the records to find a higher sunspot number. One year, six months and one week earlier -- November 9, 2011 -- the sunspot number was almost that high, at 208. Going back seven years, 10 months and 12 days to July 4, 2005, it was 192. To find activity beating the .../p

pThere will be no strongiARRL Audio News/i/strong on Thursday, May 30. strongiThe ARRL Letter/i/strong will be distributed on its usual schedule. The iAudio News/i will return on Thursday, June 6./pp/p

pBy Stan Horzepa, WA1LOUbr /Contributing Editor/pp/ppiThis week, Surfin’ checks out a ham who is developing a handheld radio that’s a cross between a smart phone and an SDR./i/ppThe strongDayton Hamvention/strong® was last weekend and I drove 735 miles to attend the event for the 25th time. Kudos go out to my smart phone and its map apps for getting me to Hamvention and back without error, as well as getting me around those.../p

pspanNow that the Morse code requirement no longer exists, those who held a Technician class license before March 21, 1987, having already passed the General theory exam, can upgrade to General class without further testing /span/ppRead More/p

pemspanBy Clara Woll, KJ6CNO (ARRL Official Relay Station)/span/em/ppspanThe ARRL National Traffic System (NTS) routinely passes practice messages to help operators build and maintain their traffic-handling skills. One way to create such messages is to solicit them from the public at preparedness fairs, exhibit booths and, of course, Field Day. /span/ppstrongspanClick /span/strongspanbthe link in the DOWNLOADS section below/b to download a pre-formatte.../span/p

pAfter an strongEF5 tornado/strong swept through Oklahoma on May 20, radio amateurs in that state assisted the American Red Cross with its communications efforts. “Amateur Radio operators were asked to support voice communications from the American Red Cross Oklahoma City Chapter Headquarters to their feeding station at the Incident Command Post located in Moore,” explained ARRL Oklahoma Section Emergency Co.../p

pThis spring, the ARRL held two balloted elections for Section Manager. ARRL members in Nebraska elected a new Section Manager, while members in Utah -- faced with a three-way race -- voted to keep their Section Manager. In addition, ARRL members in New Hampshire and Wisconsin will each get a new Section Manager, and Section Managers in seven Sections ran unopposed and were declared elected for .../p

pThe annual strongWX4NHC/strong On-the-Air Station Test from the National Hurricane Center (strongNHC/strong) in Miami will take place Saturday, June 1, 1300-2100 UTC (9 AM-5 PM EDT). “The purpose of this annual station test is to test all of our radio equipment, computers and antennas using as many modes and frequencies as possible in preparation for this year’s hurricane season,” said WX4NHC Assistant Amateur Radio Vol.../p

pWith the departure of Chairman Julius Genachowski and Commissioner Robert McDowell this past weekend, the FCC now only has three of its full complement of five Commissioners. Pending the Senate confirmation hearings for strongTom Wheeler/strong, President Obama’s pick to head the FCC, Obama has named Mignon Clyburn, the FCC’s ranking Democrat, to serve as strongActing Chairwoman/strong. The three remaining Commissioners.../p

pLast week, the ARRL strongannounced/strong that the introduction of the new TQSL 1.14 software for Logbook of The World (strongLoTW/strong) would be available on May 20. Upon further testing, three defects -- now corrected -- were reported after that announcement. Before publicly releasing a corrected version of TQSL 1.14, the software must be thoroughly retested by the spanTrusted QSL/span Software Development Team. LoTW users .../p

pARRL Headquarters will be closed Monday, May 27 in observance of the Memorial Day holiday. There will be no strongW1AW code practice or bulletin transmissions/strong that day. ARRL Headquarters will reopen Tuesday, May 28 at 8 AM (EDT). We wish everyone a safe and enjoyable holiday weekend!/pp /p

pHamvention Sunday saw the beginning of the exodus from Hara Arena, but for those who remained, there was still a lot to see.br /br /Of course, one of the major attractions was the traditional last minute bargain. There were quite a few of these to be had in the fleamarket, but Sunday sales were prominent indoors as well. Early feedback from several vendors indicated that Hamvention 2013 was a success.../p

pHamvention Saturday got off to a rousing start. By late morning the aisles in the indoor exhibitor areas were crowded to the point where movement was difficult at best.br /br /strongARRL Member Forum/strongbr /Among the first forums of the morning, the ARRL Member forum was filled to capacity. After an introduction by Great Lakes Division Vice Director Dale Williams, WA8EFK, Ohio Section Manager Frank Piper, KI8GW, dis.../p

pHamvention Saturday got off to a rousing start. By late morning the aisles in the indoor exhibitor areas were crowded to the point where movement was difficult at best.br /br /strongARRL Member Forum/strongbr /Among the first forums of the morning, the ARRL Member forum was filled to capacity. After an introduction by Great Lakes Division Vice Director Dale Williams, WA8EFK, Ohio Section Manager Frank Piper, KI8GW, dis.../p

pHamvention Friday opened in the midst of dense fog. Fortunately, the fog burned off before noon./ppbr /Attendence seemed high for a Friday with indoor exhibits swamped with amateurs soon after the doors opened at 9AM. The ARRL Expo area drew a substantial crowd with popular activities such as the W1AW 75th anniversary exhibit, the Youth Lounge and spectral purity testing courtesy of the ARRL Lab. Of c.../p

pSince we are now at (or close to) the peak of Solar Cycle 24, it is no surprise that the solar indices are up. The latest forecast predicts Solar Cycle 24 to peak this fall, but that will be determined after the fact, and it will be based on a long running average of sunspot numbers. This past week, the average daily sunspot numbers increased by more than 34 points, rising to 156.1, while the a.../p

pBy Stan Horzepa, WA1LOUbr /Contributing Editor/pp/ppiHere are some online tools to help you answer that question./i/ppAs a fan of VHF and UHF operating, I often seek out mountaintop locations so I can work some DX, unimpeded by manmade objects and Mother Nature’s higher hills. And while I appreciate the view, I often wonder how far away the horizon is./ppI discovered a great article about this topic years ago and.../p

pstrongiCQspan magazine/span/i/strong announced its 2013 Hall of Fame inductees on May 17, welcoming eight new members into the CQ Amateur Radio Hall of Fame, including former iQST/i Managing Editor Joel Kleinman, N1BKE (SK), who helmed iQST/i from 2001 until his stronguntimely death in 2012/strong. In addition, iCQ/i named two new members to the CQ DX Hall of Fame and two new members to the CQ Contest Hall of Fame./pp/ppKleinman came to the Leagu.../p

pAfter much testing, the ARRL will release a new version of Trusted QSL, the open-source development project responsible for developing and maintaining the three Logbook of the World (strongLoTW/strong) client-side applications: TQSL, TQSLCert and the TrustedQSL library. After six weeks of public beta testing, version 1.14 is ready for official release and will be available for download from the ARRL website.../p