GB0MPB

GB0MPB

INTERNATIONAL MARCONI DAY STATION LOCATED AT PORTLAND BILL

GB0MPB (Marconi Portland Bill) April 25 2015

In 1900 the Royal Navy was sufficiently convinced that Wireless Telegraphy would play a useful part in future Naval operations that it ordered 32 sets of equipment from the infant Marconi Company, some of which were no doubt installed in the capital ships of the day while others were installed in shore stations.

Shore stations were set up around the British Isles and at overseas locations, including one on Portland Bill on the Dorset coast in Southern England. These stations were of the very early "Spark gap and Coherer" type intended for limited range ship-to-shore Morse Code telegraphy operating at low frequency with wavelengths in the order of 100-500 metres. Success was achieved and by 1904 the Portland Bill station was also on record as being able to maintain communication with a similar Admiralty radio station situated in Gibraltar when propagation conditions were favourable.

In view of this early Portland Bill connection with the pioneering work of Guglielmo Marconi, the South Dorset Radio Society (SDRS) has chosen a site near to the original Admiralty station of 115 years ago to set up an Amateur Radio station for International Marconi Day on the 25th of April 2015. The station will be QRV on most amateur bands using SSB, Datamodes and, hopefully, CW, using Elecraft and Yaesu equipment feeding vertical and wire doublet antennas.

The SDRS team looks forward to working DX and UK stations during this event, and will be particularly pleased to work other International Marconi Day special event stations. Working stations in Gibraltar is a special goal!

See also: Portland Bill and the GB0MPB entry at QRZ.com

This is a new SDRS event for 2015 and special thanks must go to Phil Jones of Combens www.combensapps.co.uk on Portland for permission to use the site.