The First 100 Years Are The Hardest

I got outside Saturday afternoon to activate Cedar Hill State Park to practice my Amateur Radio Emergency Services (ARES) skills in conjunction with Parks on the Aire (POTA).  The map below shows the locations of the other stations/people I worked over the radio from the park. I'm a member of ARES,  North Texas Section, part of the national ARRL organization committed to providing communication services during emergencies.   My application for RACES - DALLAS is in the works, along with the SKYWARN training and completion of the FEMA NIMS IS-100b, IS-200b, and IS-700b courses.    I was able to work 101 contacts from the park using my Yaesu FT-991a rig, and the ATAS-120 actively tuned antenna that I recently installed in my truck.  The radio was powered by a Bioenno12V, 30Ah LiFEPo4 battery and still had plenty of juice after running 100w for 2 hours.   I used HRMS for logging on my $60 Evolve III notebook.  The LTE SIM card works very well, but the CPU is a  bit underpowered and HAM

I haven’t had much news to share, but this is just in!   I’ve made 200 contacts (C, T, S) since becoming a Centurion in June and Tribune in July.  My quest for the Senate continues - targeting March or April 2023. I need 200 more unique C/T/S contacts to achieve Tx8 - all unique. From there,  the road to the Senate requires 200 additional contacts with fellow T and S members only.  Good thing is that duplicates from the previous 400 ARE allowed!    73 Chris de WX7V   #award Chris White, WX7V, SKCC# 25995T has achieved Tx4   #Award   From:  Phil K3EW Date: Mon, 12 Sep 2022 15:12:06 CDT  Hear Ye! Hear Ye! Gather 'round and pay heed to the news of this day! Let there be revelry & celebration for yet another Centurion has advanced to the Tribune Tx4 level of SKCC achievement !!! Chris White, WX7V, SKCC# 25995T, has achieved the coveted 2nd generation SKCC member achievement known far and wide as the Tribune Tx4 award. The Tribune Tx4 award is earned by SKCC Centurions who work 200