Tiny Elephant's Contest CornerThe Latest Contest News -
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Tiny Elephant's Contest CornerThe Latest Contest News -
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In putting together my submission, I got the idea to discuss the DXCC program to explain where it came from, why it is set up the way it is, and where it may go. This program is by far the most popular activity sponsored by the ARRL with more global participation than the US alone. The present program was set up shortly after WW II since many of the world’s countries were radically altered. Along the way, it has evolved from merely working them all to separate awards for Phone, CW, RTTY, or Mixed, and individual band awards for 10, 40, 80 and 160 meters. The basic award is a certificate for working 100 countries, which is very easy to do with packet and modest antennas. As you build up your total, additional submissions can be made for endorsements in increments of 25 countries. The number of award incentives available makes it a highly personalized endeavor depending on your operating forte.
The current DXCC program counts contacts made with countries after November 15, 1945. The DXCC program actually goes back to September 1937 for its roots; however, the vast changes brought about by WWII necessitated starting over again. The program has pretty much operated under the same set of rules since. Old timers actually have country totals that exceed the current total of 332 countries. This is because they have worked a number of countries that no longer exist. A recent example of this would be East Germany, which became a deleted country after Germany reunified.
The country totals that appear on the DXCC list include far more than the members of the United Nations do. In addition to sovereignty, the DXCC country qualification criteria also include an entity’s separation by water or by an intervening country at a defined minimum distance from its “parent” country. For example, Hawaii is considered a separate DXCC country because it more than 500 miles from the continental US. Similarly, Alaska qualifies because the intervening country (Canada) results in it being more than 75 miles from the “lower 48”. For islands that are part of a country, the separation must be 225 miles. This rule accounts for a number of “countries” that are officially territorial administrations of Australia such as Norfolk Island, Willis Island, or Macquarie Island.
Shortly after the DXCC program celebrated its 50 anniversary, the DXCC Advisory Committee met to consider a number of proposals for adjusting country qualification criteria. It seemed that the popularity of the program had grown to the point where a large number of DX’ers began fretting about running out of countries to work. In some cases, there were loopholes in the rules that allowed some areas to qualify as a country that should not. The controversial example of this is Scarborough Reef a small cluster of rocks in the South China Sea. In 1995, a DXpedition took place to the reef under the auspices that it would be credited as a new DXCC country by virtue of the water separation rule. The QSL card from the group raised a lot of eyebrows: the card featured a photo of the operators standing on a wooden platform barely a few feet above the water. In heavy seas the reef is a shipwreck waiting to happen.
The specter of hams scurrying to any shallow sand spit with a pontoon platform to host a small tent, generator, and a vertical in the name of “a new one” meant something had to be done. In addition, less bizarre ambiguities had surfaced in the past 10 years with the break up of the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia and prospective autonomy for Palestine. The new rules now specify land separation of 100 kilometers for an entity separated from its parent - i.e., the section where the capital is located - by an intervening country.
The changes for island groups are more substantial. For an island to qualify as such, if must have visible land at high tide of at least 100 meters between two points. The minimum separation between an island and its mainland or its parent group of islands was changed from 225 miles to 350 kilometers, thus shortening the distance about 15 miles. A second island in that country can qualify if its separation is 800 kilometers from the other qualified island and 350 kilometers from the parent. The easiest way to visualize this is to think of 3 islands arranged in a triangle with one island sort of between the other two. The two outer islands would have to be 350 kilometers from the middle island and at least 800 kilometers from each other. The 800 kilometers is about 20 miles shorter than the old requirement of 500 miles.
The slight reduction in separation immediately spawned new countries in the Pacific. The island group known as French Polynesia that includes Tahiti now sports the Austral Islands and Marquesas Islands as two new DXCC countries. Likewise, Temotu Island in the Solomon Islands now finds itself hosting foreigners carrying exotic cases and a bunch of wire and shiny poles. The emergence of new ones a few of years ago caused a feeding frenzy on the bands. The most recent addition to the DXCC list came last year as Palestine was officially recognized with limited autonomy to regulate matters such as amateur radio. Several DX’ers joined up in Gaza to put E44DX on the air in the fall of 1999.
Are there any more new ones? No; not yet, anyway. I would not be surprised, however, if some new country does show up and not due to solely to political changes either. The recent availability of high-resolution satellite images for commercial use together with affordable GPS receivers is sure to have some adventurous amateurs scanning the oceans for some unnamed rocks that can be accurately measured at 100.1 meters long that are just begging for an antenna. What better celebration of the sunspot maximum?
As we enter Spring, here are some contests that you can play around in to celebrate the return of warm weather: