If like me, you have always wanted to experience the thrill of being at the DX end of the pileup, but couldn’t, due to financial or time constraints, read on. You can be the DX (and work on your contesting skills) without ever leaving home!

Last September while operating from home as K1JN/130 as part of the ARRL Hiram Percy Maxim 130th Birthday Celebration, I discovered that I could easily generate pileups of European stations on 10 meters. The only drawback here is that this was a one-time event and participation was limited to ARRL members holding certain field appointments or other positions.

I recently found another way to operate with a rare callsign and spice up the summer doldrums, and the best part is, anyone can do it! When there is a local event, you can apply for and operate with a 1X1 call.

Here is the story of my operation as Whiskey One Sierra. For the past couple of months, the big media story here has been the participation of the New London, CT area in OP Sail 2000. For four days, from July 12-15, the cities of New London and Groton would host 40 tall ships from around the world. Upwards of 500,000 visitors were expected. It occurred to me that this would be the perfect opportunity to activate a special event station. I used the ARRL web site to apply for the 1X1 call W1S. Several days later, I received an email from ARRL that the use of the callsign was granted.

Due to my work schedule, operating time was limited to mornings. As luck would have it, propagation during the four days was off, the A index ranged from 19 to 31. The openings to Europe that I envisioned never did materialize. Still, I was able to maintain a rate of almost 60 QSOs per hour running 500 watts to a tribander at 72’. During six and a half hours of SSB operation over the four days, I made 369 contacts in 20 countries. There were quite a few pleasant surprises. On twenty meters on Saturday morning stations called me from Australia, New Zealand, Japan, and even one from Nauru! I moved up to 15 meters and made several contacts with Belgium, France, Italy, Scotland, and Malta. I made many stateside and Canadian contacts. A lot of people that called had interesting stories. Some had lived here or visited the area before. One gentleman was 94 years old. An remarkable occurrence that I haven’t quite figured out yet is that all the mobile stations that called me were as loud or louder than the fixed stations.

It is good operating practice to verify the call of each station you work, announce your call and what your special event is often, along with your QSL information. I chose to QSL all DX contacts automatically through the buro and to request a SASE to my home call for all stateside contacts. By Friday morning, envelopes were arriving for Wednesday’s contacts. I used the QSL kit from W7NN and an inkjet printer to create commemorative QSLs featuring the OP Sail logo. If you decide that a special event operation is for you, good luck and enjoy being the DX!