01/17/2005 | K3EAR Once again as last year the crew chiefs WA1HHN & N3EMF of the South Mountain Contest Club elected to enter the September VHF Contest as a high power single operation. The man shown here at the "Helm" is none other than Pete Walters K9PW driving in from Illinois, who has contested with us before. He tells us he likes the different perspective from the "East Coast". The South Mountain site had been recovering from extensive lightning damage received before and after the June contest, damaging two rotors, five controllers, several computers and monitors. The station gear was setup for one single-op control position and was operated manually unlike the previous September 'test, having been more automated. Yet despite all of this, with the contest site's robust fourteen band effort, Pete was able to hammer out another 100K more in contest points, scoring well over last years efforts, putting an excellant score into the books which along with other K3EAR record scores, will stand for some time to come! Congratulations Pete, for a job well done!! -- N3EMF