Rusty Moore, K1FVK, writes on the stars-radio list:
We’re one month away from Thanksgiving, and a month and a day from the start of The 3916 Nets’ annual Santa Net, which year begins Friday evening, November 25th. The net will run every night through December 24th at 8:15 pm EST on 3916 kHz with pre-net check-ins opening at 8:00 both on the air and online at www.CQSanta.com. NESciTech currently has two nights in December slated for net operation: Thursday the 22nd, and Friday the 23rd. Families will register through the NESciTech website and arrive on their scheduled night between 6:45 and 7:00. If there’s enough family interest (and volunteer commitment) I don’t see why we couldn’t add more nights to the schedule.
We’ll need a few volunteers to pull this off:
- an operator (one per night), General class or higher
- a back-up operator (one per night) in case the primary can’t make it in
- a greeter to welcome families in and guide them into the radio room where they’ll meet the operator and get put on the pre-net list
- helpers to assist parents in keeping their kids entertained down the hall while waiting for their turn on the air
Families that are unable to bring their children to NEST can listen to the Santa Net via live-streaming on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCnNhXbexBDlvlnlz9jQkIvA/live or through a Utah-based SDR receiver on WebSDR at http://websdr1.sdrutah.org:8901/index1a.html?tune=3916lsb. There are archived off-air recordings from last year’s sessions on the YouTube channel for anyone curious to hear what the Santa Net sounds like. The Santa Net is also a great opportunity for hams to dip their toes into net operations with a very approachable group (The 3916 Nets bill themselves as “the friendliest nets in all of ham radio”).
Here’s a link to the Santa Net’s “about” page: https://www.cqsanta.com/about. On the home page you’ll find videos of children talking with Santa on-air.
Please let Bob or me know if you’re interested in participating.