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3B9C and now for the QSL
cards |
One month on from the close of
3B9C, the job is far from finished.
Our 20ft container, complete with 4.5 tonnes of equipment is on the water,
on its way back to the United Kingdom. When it arrives in a few weeks time,
everything needs to be unloaded, cleaned and checked, before being
distributed to a variety of owners all over the UK.
While we wait for the container, our QSL post office box has been very busy.
There were several hundred QSL requests in the box before the team arrived
home. Over the past month, the number has grown each morning. The post
office in Church Stretton has never seen anything like it. How can one
person in a small village be so popular?
In reality, 3B9C has more than one person involved with QSL cards. To be
precise, there are 10 QSL managers receiving and processing cards. We took
the unusual decision not to announce a call sign for our QSL manager. Before
the DXpedition, we advised our PO box address and that full information was
available at 3b9c.com and qrz.com. When asked for a QSL manager on air,
operators simply said "...QSL information can be found at www.3b9c.com...".
The fascinating fact here, is that not one person queried this or asked for
a traditional call sign.
Direct QSL applications have been arriving at the rate of several hundred
per day. The envelopes are divided into roughly equal piles and once a week
are sent to the 10 QSL managers. Each manager has been provided with a full
copy of the 3B9C log, StarLog, and each application is carefully checked.
Using specially written software, StarQSL, each manager can connect to a
central server via the internet. Detailed statistics can be viewed online
via StarServer and at any one moment, QSL managers can tell exactly how many
QSOs have received a QSL. In addition, we know how many countries have QSLed,
by band or mode and can examine statistics by country, continent or IOTA
island. We know how many cards have been returned direct and via the bureau.
Each manager has a supply of IRCs and will make a weekly trip to their local
post office to mail cards. In addition to the direct requests, one QSL
manager is responsible for online QSL requests. To date, 2,415 online
requests have been received and, again, this number grows by the day.
At the time of writing, we are expecting to receive QSL cards from the
printers within a few days. As soon as the cards arrive, the 10 QSL
managers will be busy answering the first few thousand requests.
More Information
Direct QSL cards
SWL cards
Online requests
Bureau cards
QSL criteria
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Principal Sponsor:
Yaesu
Major Sponsors |
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