A practice fox hunt turned into an actual radio direction finding event on Saturday, July 11, 2009 to combat interference that had silenced the Genesis Amateur Radio Society‘s repeater in Plymouth for three days. Genesis club members traced the interfering signal to the intersection of Routes 28 and 58 in Wareham, MA but could not make further progress. GARS member Kevin O’Donnell, K1KOD contacted Bruce Hayden, NI1X for assistance.
“I said the South Shore Fox Hunters were going to be on a fox hunt Saturday morning and that I would ask the participants to help find the interference after the hunt.” Hayden added that “those participating that day were Whitman Amateur Radio Club members.”
Bruce Hayden, NI1X, Jeremy Breef-Pilz, KB1REQ, Roy Logan, KB1CYV, Jeff Lehmann N1ZZN and Gary Cumiskey W1GRC “saddled up” and headed to Wareham to find the source of the interference.
The team of NI1X and KB1REQ found the source in a trailer park; W1GRC volunteered to approach the owner. The interference soon disappeared. N1ZZN reported that the owner said that some visiting kids “must have pushed the transmit lock bar down on his desk mike leaving the transmitter on all the time.”
Kudos to the South Shore Fox Hunters for resolving this interference issue.
-Thanks, NI1X