I’m usually with my club doing Field Day, summer and winter, but this year my family was rocked with Norovirus the week before WFD. We knew when and where we caught it and it was obvious that I would be infectious during the contest. So with great regret, I had to let my club know I wouldn’t be available.
In a round-about way that may have been the best timed disease ever as the entire country was hit with a horrible winter storm. Real temps were in the low single digits and wind chills were -20. Plus a foot of snow fell on Sunday before the contest ended. My friends were suffering outdoors, but I was comfortable at home (my unheated shack was about 60 degrees).
I didn’t work many stations because I had my eye set on getting as many multiplier points as possible. I copied the bulletin, sent and received messages via WinLink, made both a FM and Linear Satellite contact, operated three different modes, and made contacts on six different bands. When it was all said and done, I worked 34 stations and had a multiplier of 17, over the 4 hours that I was on the air on Saturday. Honestly I should have stayed on the air another two hours and could have easily worked 100 more CW stations on 20/15/10.
