To see the spots on DX Summit of all YOTA stations, click here.

 

YOTA Month 2023 event participation in the Americas

This special event is sponsored by IARU Region 1 YOTA (Europe/Africa/Middle East/Parts of Asia).  They are sponsoring an award for working YOTA stations all around the world.

Stations located within the Americas include:

In Argentina: LR1YOTA

In Canada:  VE3YOUTH, VE2YOTA, and VA7YOTA

In El Salvador: YS1YOTA

In the USA:

K8Y
K8O
K8T, and
K8A

Stations will have the callsign suffix YOTA, except for the USA and Canada stations.

THE USA TEAM IS STILL LOOKING FOR OPERATORS AGE 25 or UNDER TO TAKE SHIFTS! Contact W0AAE to sign up!

The information below is copied directly from the official web site for December YOTA Month:  events.ham-yota.com.

"The entire month of December several youth operators will become active with YOTA as suffix in the callsign. The idea for this is to show the amateur radio hobby to youth and to encourage youth to be active on the ham radio waves.

Give a demonstration in a school or local club, gather together with your friends, grab a pizza and make some QSOs or enjoy a great pile-up. Let us all show this great hobby to the world!

Feel free to make a QSO with the youth ops, they are happy to get some attention and exchange information. Licensed and unlicensed youth will be making QSOs, so be aware this could be their first radio contact ever and give them a chance to experience a possible new hobby.

These are a few of the many stations participating in this initiative.

More info on https://events.ham-yota.com

These callsigns will be used by multiple youth operators of various ages  during YOTA Month 2023. Operators will use their home stations and remotes. They will be active on CW, SSB, digital on most HF bands and possibly satellites. All of these operators are under 26 years old. We plan on rotating the callsigns throughout the month.

QSL Policy

The December YOTA Month Team is ONLY sending QSL cards if you request them via the Clublog OQRS system!
OQRS supports:

  • QSL via Bureau: This request is FREE of charge!
  • QSL Direct: 3 EUR
  • QSL Direct (more than 5 cards: please email us for a custom postage price.)

Due to the huge amount of QSO's that are being made throughout this event, receiving QSL is hard to handle.
You do not need to send us your QSL card.  Received cards will NOT be answered. If you want our QSL card, you can request it via OQRS using the link above.

Contact: qsl@ham-yota.com

If you are a SWL and want to receive your QSL card(s) feel free to fill in this form.
The DYM Team will crosscheck the QSO(s) with the database to verify the received contacts.

  • After the checking process cards will be sent via Bureau automatically. Disclaimer: To receive QSL Card(s) via Bureau you have to be a member of a Bureau!
  • Though, if you want to receive it via Direct please get in contact with us at qsl@ham-yota.com.

AWARDS

Awards can be claimed on this page and are completely free.

Manager: EA1JAY
Contact: awards@ham-yota.com

In total there are 4 awards to achieve:

  • Bronze (15 points)
  • Silver (35 points)
  • Gold (65 points)
  • Platinum (105 points)

To obtain an award you have to make / log QSOs (on-air contacts) with / between the YOTA special event stations listed on this page.

Rules:

  • Awards can be requested by licensed amateur radio operators and shortwave listeners (SWL).
  • SWL's must submit 2-way communication details. Details of communication required: callsign, worked station, date and time (UTC), band and mode. This requirement also applies to enquiries towards organizers regarding your missing QSOs from the database.
  • Awards are free, they will be electronically distributed.
  • Awards can be achieved by fulfilling the requirements of award levels.
  • Scores are calculated based on your QSOs with YOTA special event stations, following these rules.
  • Only QSOs made between 1 December 2020 00:00 UTC and 31 December 2020 23:59 UTC can be used to apply for the awards.
  • All bands and all modes are valid.
  • Equation for calculation of your scores is simple: 'Number of points' = ('Worked stations' * 2) + 'Worked bandslots'. This also means, you get 3 points (+1 'station' * 2 + 1 'bandslot') for the first QSO with a station, and 1 point for every other bandslot with this specific station.
  • Bandslots are combination of all amateur radio bands and CW, PHone and DIGI modes. Contacts made using the Morse Code count as CW, any mode using transmission of speech (LSB, USB, FM, AM etc) counts as PHone, and all other modes combined count as DIGI.
  • Example:
    • You work / hear OH2YOTA on 80CW (first contact = 2 points, new bandslot = 1 point)
    • You work / hear OH2YOTA again, this time on 80SSB (2nd contact = 0 points, new bandslot = 1 point)
    • You work / hear PA6YOTA on 40M in PSK32 (DIGI) (first contact = 2 points, new bandslot = 1 point)
    • You work / hear PA6YOTA again on 40M, this time in FT8 (DIGI) (second contact = 0 points, duplicate bandslot = 0 points)
    • TOTAL: 7 points

Plaques

Moreover, we are offering 7 different wooden plaques after the DYM activity in the following categories:

  • Most stations contacted (CW)
    First to contact the most unique active YOTA stations in CW mode within the award program
  • Most stations contacted (SSB)
    First to contact the most unique active YOTA stations in SSB mode within the award program
  • Most stations contacted (DIGITAL)
    First to contact the most unique active YOTA stations in DIGITAL modes within the award program
  • Most stations contacted
    First to contact the most unique active YOTA stations overall within the award program
  • Best overall score OM
    Best overall achieved award score by an OM
  • Best overall score YL
    Best overall achieved award score by a YL
  • Best overall score Youngster
    Best overall achieved award score by a Youngster (< 26)

Only one plaque will be awarded per entry.

A station winning a plaque will not be considered for a sub-area award; the plaque will be awarded to the runner-up in that area.

Example:

If you are the station who contacted the most stations overall, you cannot be considered for most stations contacted (CW, SSB, DIGITAL) as well as best overall scores anymore.
This applies to all categories.

The DYM team will announce the winners based on the award calculation on the YOTA Social Media Channels as well as contact them via their email address (as on QRZ.com) after January 20th 2023.

If there is no response by the winning ham within 7 days after the announcement, we will shift the plaque to the runner-up in that area due to missing shipping details.

SWL Info

We want to offer SWLs an easy way to participate in our event as well.
You can participate by registering an account, and filling in your SWL logs.
You can earn awards, just like the radio operators, but instead of by contacting them, you log contacts they make.
You can also request your own SWL QSLs on events.ham-yota.com.

Feel free to register your callsign / nickname on events.ham-yota.com now.
If you have an official SWL call, please use that one as personal callsign.
If you don't have an official callsign, you can use a nickname, or your full name.
Please don't use just your first name, though.

CONTACT

General Event Organization

For all general questions NOT related to awards, QSL or the logbook of this callsign, please contact us at info@ham-yota.com. Note that this is a general email address for all participating special event stations!"

Participation Coordinator - Americas
Station Coordinator - USA

Please contact Kees (WØAAE) or Blake (KN4VKY) for all questions regarding the USA stations (K8Y, K8O, K8T, and K8A).  They are also helping to coordinate participation by stations in North, Central, and South America.

Participating YOTA stations must be registered online at events.ham-yota.com and be sponsored by their IARU member society.

Station Coordinator - Argentina

Emiliano Gutiérrez (LW6EGE)

Station Coordinator - Canada

Harrie Jones (VE3HYS)

Station Coordinator - El Salvador

Juan Erazo (YS1JFE)

Station Coordinator - Honduras

David (HR2DDL)

 

You can read our press release here.

Past December YOTA Months: