Amateur Radio Station WD8RIF | POTA Activation Dayton Aviation Heritage National Historic Park, OH

On Sunday, May 18, 2025, three members of the Southeast Ohio Radio Adventure Team performed two successful activations of Dayton Aviation Heritage National Historic Park in Ohio as part of the Parks on the Air (POTA; link) program.

Following a long, busy, weekend of Four Days in May and Hamvention, Thomas Witherspoon, K4SWL; Eric McFadden, WD8RIF; and Miles McFadden, KD8KNC, visited Dayton Aviation Heritage National Historical Park at Carillon Historical Park to perform two POTA activations. They were accompanied by Len Touth, W8VQ, and were later joined by Vince d'Eon, VE6LK/AI7LK; Paul Braun, WD9GCO; and Jack Albert, N9ITB.

Eric had planned that he, Miles, Thomas, and Len would drive south-west to Brookville Lake in Indiana on Sunday of Hamvention for activations of the four POTA units located on that lake. However, they decided to attend the Sunday morning forum presented by Vince d'Eon, VE6LK/AI7LK, which meant that there was not enough time for a long drive and four activations. Instead, they decided to activate the much closer Dayton Aviation Heritage National Historic Park. Because of the possibility that large numbers of POTA activators leaving Hamvention might have had the same idea, they chose to visit the less well known Carillon Historical Park unit of the Dayton Aviation Heritage National Historic Park for their activations instead of the better known Huffman Prairie Flying Field Interpretive Center or either of the much smaller units in downtown Dayton.

The four arrived at Carillon Historical Park about 1745 UTC and were surprised by the extremely large number of cars at the park. Apparently, some sort of festival was underway. They were directed to park on the grass adjacent to parking lot and, once parked, they were able to see that, despite the very large number of cars, the grassy area surrounding Deeds Carillon was virtually empty.

As they had hoped, Thomas, Eric, and Len had good cell-signal within the park, and they would be able to spot themselves on POTA Spots (link) and to use POTA Spots to identify possible park-to-park (P2P) QSO opportunities.

Thomas quickly chose a shady tree suitable for supporting his wire antenna and commenced setting up his video camera and station.

Len and Eric scouted the area and chose a shaded spot not too near to Thomas for their station. Because he plans to buy one for himself very soon, Len very much wanted to perform an activation using an Elecraft KX2, and Eric wanted to perform an activation using Thomas's Chelegance MC-750 resonant field vertical. While Thomas fiddled around setting up his camera, etc., Eric deployed a station for Len and himself to use, deploying the MC-750 configured for 20m, and placing his Elecraft KX2 on his folding camp-chair's flip-up table. Because he had already activated this park, and since it was a new park for Len, Eric allowed Len to perform his activation first, just in case propagation were to sour.

Thomas eventually got his video camera sorted, threw a line into his tree, pulled up an antenna, connected up his KX2, and began making QSOs. Since Len was already operating on 20m, Thomas started his operation on 30m.

Thomas's antenna.

Thomas operates.

Thomas, foreground, and Len, background,
operate; photo by Miles McFadden.

Thomas operates; photo by Miles McFadden.

Thomas found first 30m, and then 17m, to be slow going. Len found 20m to be in great shape and he had no trouble at all validating his activation by making more than ten QSOs on the band. Surrendering 20m to Thomas, Len gave Eric the KX2/MC-750 station so Eric could perform his activation.

Eric started his activation by making a P2P QSO on 20m with Thomas at 1824 UTC.

Because Thomas was still running on 20m, Eric found a clear frequency on 17m to run, began calling "CQ POTA", and self-spotted himself on POTA Spots. His only contact on this band came at 1831 UTC with stalwart POTA hunter AA5UZ in Louisiana.

Unaware that Thomas had himself switched to 40m, Eric switched to that band but realized he couldn't stay there because proximity meant that Thomas's 5w signal was all over the band. Before switching away from 40m, however, Eric completed a P2P QSO with Thomas at 1840 UTC.

Now that 20m was available, Eric found himself a clear frequency on that band to run, began calling "CQ POTA", and self-spotted himself on POTA Spots. His first QSO in this run came at 1848 UTC with WX7V who was activating Copper Breaks State Park (US-3001) in Texas. QSOs came steadily, with Eric's eleventh QSO in this run coming at 1906 UTC with NA7C in Utah. This run included a P2P QSO with AE0PL who was activating Pawnee State Recreation Area (US-5649) in Nebraska; a P2P QSO with M0TTQ who was performing a three-fer activation of Farlington Marshes Nature Reserve (GB-4591), Langstone Harbour Conservation Reserve (GB-0022), and King Charles III England Coast National Scenic Trail (GB-0711) in England; and QSOs with operators located in Arkansas, Nebraska, New Hampshire, Ohio, Oklahoma, Texas (3), Utah, and Washington.

In all, Eric made fourteen QSOs in a bit over half an hour of on-air time. All of Eric's QSOs were CW and were made with five watts output.

A full report about Thomas's activation is available here: QRPer.com.

About the time that Eric finished his activation, and before he could begin to tear down his station, part of the Ham Radio Workbench (link) gang arrived: Paul Braun, WB9GCO; Jack Albert, N9ITB; and Vince d'Eon, VE6LK/AI7LK. (Thomas is, as everyone knows, also part of the Ham Radio Workbench show.)

Vince didn't activate but did record video while Paul and Jack hooked Paul's 100w HF go-box to the Chelegance MC-750 and began taking turns with the microphone.

Paul's 100w SSB station.

Paul operates while Jack awaits his turn with the mic.

About this time, Thomas learned via text that Dan Presley, N7CQR, was really struggling to make QSOs with his Elecraft KH1 at the Huffman Prairie Flying Field Interpretive Center unit of Dayton Aviation Heritage National Historic Park—about seven miles away as the crow flies—so Thomas, Vince, Len, and Eric took turns using Thomas's KH1 and 4' whip to make same-unit P2P QSOs with Dan. (Eric logged his 20m P2P QSO at 1934 UTC.)

Vince works Dan P2P.

Len works Dan P2P.

Vince interviews Len for
his "One Question" series.

Thomas, Vince, Len, and Eric walked back to the Paul and Jack operation to discover that Paul and Jack had each succeeded in making only three QSOs in the half-hour or forty minutes they had been on the air. To help, Thomas, Vince, Len, and Eric took turns using Eric's KX2 in walkie-talkie mode on several bands to help Paul and Jack validate their activations. Watch Vince's video to see how it went: YADLAWF - Yet Another Dummy Load Activation With Friends.

Eric also submitted his log to the World Wide Flora and Fauna in Amateur Radio (WWFF; link) program.