World Amateur Radio Championships: Germany aims for the hat-trick

There are other things going on in the shadow of soccer. For example, many thousands of radio amateurs traditionally meet every year on the second weekend in July for the World Radio Championships on the short-wave bands. Co-organizer Björn Bieske explained to the daily newspaper "Freies Wort": "More than 50 radio amateurs will be active in the World Cup team for Germany and transmit our callsign DA0HQ and our association code "DARC" in voice radio and telegraphy to all regions of the world." DARC stands for the German Amateur Radio Club, an amateur radio association with 32,000 members.

The central German radio station for the radio world championship has been located in Ilmenau, Thuringia, since before the fall of the Berlin Wall. As Y61HQ, it was the nucleus of the German national team and later operated under the name DA0HQ. For the World Cup, it now comprises twelve radio stations at eight locations: Imenau and Jessen, Kerpen and Mühldorf am Inn as well as Schöppingen, Weetzen, Wetzstein and Wittgenborn.

Good prospects of defending the title

The radio amateurs of the DARC team have a very good chance of defending their World Championship title again. Germany can win the hat-trick after 2022 and 2023. Germany has already won a total of 16 world championship titles in 39 competitions. The results for the current World Championships will not be known until a few days after the competition following an extensive evaluation.

From Saturday to Sunday, the aim of the World Radio Championships is to make as many radio connections as possible with as many countries as possible within 24 hours in non-stop operation. To do this, the radio amateurs must recognize the sometimes rapidly changing radio conditions as well as possible in order to take advantage of every possible connection to certain regions on all six available frequency ranges. Connections to Australia, for example, are only possible for a short time on some frequency ranges, and then the directional antenna should also be pointed in that direction.

This requires a great deal of knowledge about the ionospheric processes involved in radio wave propagation as well as a feel for so-called openings in certain regions. In order to make good use of short connection opportunities, the radio operators must be highly trained in both Morse telegraphy and radiotelephony and be able to exchange the control digits for connection verification quickly and even in the event of severe interference.

There is also a bit of strategy involved in radioing: radio connections count differently: connections with your own country are worth 1 point, connections with your own continent are worth 3 points and connections with other continents are worth 5 points. What's more, each country acts as a multiplier on each radio frequency range, and doubly so if you reach it in Morse telegraphy and voice radio.

Almost half of the connections in the previous year were made with German stations. To this end, the association does a lot of advertising and every year over 3000 different stations from Germany support the world champion station with one or more radio connections.

The radio stations of the amateur radio associations from various countries, which are active simultaneously on all radio bands, are particularly attractive to individual participants. In a sprint competition during the World Championships, for example, participants try to reach all twelve DA0HQ stations. In the past, some have achieved this within five minutes of the start of the competition.

Last year, almost 22,000 radio connections were made with the whole world. This was partly due to excellent radio propagation conditions thanks to high sunspot relative numbers and a low level of interference. The number of possible connections can fluctuate greatly due to the intensity of particle radiation caused by solar activity and even during periods of high activity, interference can result in significant losses. Moreover, this does not affect all participants equally, so a little luck is also involved.

Tactics, technology, ordeals

To win the World Cup, it is no longer enough to simply set up high antennas and strong transmitters; you also have to keep an eye on the competition from other countries. The evaluation of the logs with all radio connections from the previous year is an important support here. Every year, DA0HQ's team fine-tunes the radio technology, antennas, reception technology and computer networks, which are particularly important for connecting and coordinating with external locations. Automated monitoring by receiving stations also helps to assess how well you can be heard in different regions of the world and to detect faults during operation, for example due to antenna or cable damage. The hustle and bustle with many stations, some of which are calling at the same time, and sometimes hours of lull without calls requires a high degree of stress resistance. In view of the 24-hour operating time, shift work is also essential.

The competition demands a lot of energy even before the actual start. The radio amateurs set up additional antennas especially for the competition in order to be able to pick up very quiet signals. Repairs to existing antenna systems also have to be completed in good time beforehand and are often carried out without improvisation. But when there is no World Cup on, things can also be done on a smaller scale: Thuringia's Minister President Bodo Ramelow (Left Party) has already visited the station in Ilmenau and emphasized that radio amateurs can restore local and global communication links with simple means and improvisation.

(mil)