The "Battleship Texas Amateur Radio Station" participated in the "Museum Ships Weekend Event," sponsored by the USS Salem Amateur Radio Club, July 22, 2001. The object was to give radio amateurs a chance to contact historic museum ships. Pictures and text by Frank Cooper.

Mouse Click here for the USS Salem ARC Event Page

The three radio operators for the event. (L to R) John Cole, W5AUH; Reid Shipp, WA5ARI, and Frank Cooper, W5VID

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The first task was to hang a temporary inverted V, 20 meter antenna from the hook of a ship's crane

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The next task was to set up our equipment in the ship's galley among the pots and pans. Sometime in the future these events will take place in one of the ships's regular radio rooms.

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The ship's galley became a temporary radio room

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Reid Ship makes a contact on 20 meters single sideband. Reid is using a Kenwood TS 820 transceiver running approximately 50 watts. We made our first contact at 11:35 a.m. and our last at 3:51 p.m. We talked with 102 stations in the United States, Canada, and Mexico. This included seven museum ships. The July temperature on the ship's deck was approximately 100 degrees F. We had a nice breeze in the Ship's galley radio room most of the day. As the afternoon sunlight began to stream into the non air conditioned galley it became too hot to continue operation.

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A view from the back of the temporary radio room set up in the galley. Reid Shipp is at the operating position near the door and John Cole waits to relieve Reid.

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A sign at the doorway of the radio room/galley answers the first question of visitors. Thanks to Barry Ward, Battleship Museum Curator for his helpful assistance and the Battleship Texas Museum Staff who helped us erect the antenna. One of the guys has a great pitching arm. He threw the ball of rope through the crane hook so that we could pull up the antenna.

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Mouse click Here to Return to HVRA Battleship Web Page

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