Don’t stop believin’!
Sorry folks but this is yet another YI9PSE post. But, unless I work them before they leave Iraq, this will be the last YI9PSE post. Honest.
I’m writing this blog entry in response to a number of discussion threads I’m seeing, DX cluster comments, and my own experiences around the YI9PSE DXpedition, still active from Iraq and scheduled to be on the bands from Kurdistan in the north of the country until the 12th of April.
I think many people are surprised by how difficult it’s proving to be getting a QSO with YI9PSE. Their website may have led many (me included) to assume that they’d be loud on many bands to most parts of the amateur radio world (the website says that they have ‘amplifiers’ and ‘gain antennas’). This isn’t the case (based on my own experience and that of many others). It seems that they have been subjected to circumstances in Iraq they weren’t expecting and poor band conditions (partly due to the recent solar storm we’ve all been subjected to). This has led to widespread frustration with many bemoaning the lack of those anticipated big signals from YI9PSE.
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