Highlights of 2026 Annual General Meeting

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Written by: Administrator

Category: Society

Published: 31 August 2026

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The Yellowknife Amateur Radio Society AGM for 2026 was conducted on 2026-08-30.

Highlights:

• Five members in attendance (quorum established) - 09:00 AM
• AGM Minutes 2025 reviewed and approved
• A number of members paid their annual dues ($40 for individual; $60 for family; and $800 for corporate).  Dues can be paid via electronic transactions to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .
• Elections - by acclamation:
  • President - Chris Cameron VE8WD
  • Vice President - John Howe VE8JJ
  • Secretary-Treasurer - Ian Rennie VE8IR
• Reports
  • President - Update on Inner Whalebacks, VE8PAT and crank-up tower
  • Secretary-Treasurer - financial statements; discussion over RAC affiliation and RAC insurance; proposed new bylaws; GNWT relations; CFARs;
• No new business
• Ajourned 10:04 AM

Amateur Radio/Scientific Software

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Written by: Administrator

Category: Understanding

Published: 30 August 2026

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Amateur Radio Software

• WJSTX - Weak Signal communication by K1JT [Originally developed for radio astronomy and SETI, WSJT-X offers eleven different protocols or modes: FST4, FT4, FT8, JT4, JT9, JT65, Q65, MSK144, WSPR, FST4W, and Echo. Aimed at making QSOs including for meteorscatter and earth-moon-earth (i.e. moonbounce).  Also Weak Signal Propagation Reporter (WSPR)]
• FLDIGI - Fldigi is a modem program for most of the digital modes used by radio amateurs today: CW, PSK, MFSK, RTTY, Hell, DominoEX, Olivia, and Throb are all supported. It can help calibrate a sound card to a time signal and do frequency measurement tests. 
• N1MM+ - Ham Radio contest logging program

Scientific Software

• Spectran and more - Several programs but we have used Spectran for frequency analysis.  There is a great usage of that program to listen to the beacon from a satellite's orbit decaying and burning up in the atmosphere.  Used for NDS reception (the Society has done this too).
• linSmith - Smith Charting program.  For analysis of discrete components or transmission lines.

Satellites Falling to Earth (Operation Morning Light 1978)

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Written by: Administrator

Category: Civil Defence

Published: 28 August 2026

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Kosmos 954

Kosmos 954 (Wikipedia)

Satellites falling to the Earth may sound like an unlikely event of concern in the Northwest Territories, but it has happened and is therefore a foreseeable event.  Kosmos 954 was one such satellite.  Launched in September 1977 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kosmos 954 was a reconnaissance satellite designed to monitor oceanic traffic including surface vessels and nuclear submarines using radar.  It was powered by a liquid sodium-potassium thermionic converter driven by a nuclear reactor containing about 50 kg of highly enriched uranium (U²³⁵).  By December its orbit became increasingly erratic.  North American Aerospace Defence Command (NORAD) identified the satellite with Space Catalog Number 10361. Soviet Union officials warned their western counterparts that they had lost control of the satellite and that the system designed to safely eject the reactor core had failed.  On 24 January the satellite re-entered the Earth's atmosphere on a northeastward track over western Canada.  The debris field stretched for 600 km from Great Slave Lake to Baker Lake (now in Nunavut).   

Read more: Satellites Falling to Earth (Operation Morning Light 1978)

Civil Defence

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Written by: Administrator

Category: Civil Defence

Published: 27 August 2026

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{This article is partially original but also drawn verbatim from Wikipedia entries: Civil Defence; Civil defence by country - still being reviewed...}

Civil Defence logo on a Thunderbolt 1003 siren (Wikipedia)

Introduction

Civil defence is a concept aimed at the protection of citizens of a state who are non-combatants (hors de combat) from human-made or natural disasters.  The concept has its origins in the First World War with the bombing by German Zeppelins and Gotha bombers of the population centres of England.  In the 1920s the Air Raid Precautions Committee was established and it estimated that, based on the raids of World War 1, there could be as many as 17,500 casualties per week.  With increasing political tensions in the 1930s and especially with the apparent air superiority of fascist Germany and Italy (and lessons from the Spanish Civil War - i.e. Guernica), the UK Civil Defence Service was established.  Over 1.9M served with Civil Defence and 2,400 died from enemy action.  The United States did something similar. 

Read more: Civil Defence

Bylaws Committee

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Written by: Administrator

Category: Society

Published: 27 August 2026

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The Yellowknife Amateur Radio Society bylaws date from 1997 and may be found at: Download YARS Constitution 1997 .  They are out of date and do not reflect current Society procedures or aspects of the current Societies Act under which the Society is incorporated.  The GNWT Societies Registry has some public resources about amending bylaws.  This will cost the Society $20.  While the file name says Constitution, the title of the document is Yellowknife Amateur Radio Society Bylaws.  Therefore this is a bylaws project.  

Read more: Bylaws Committee

Weekly 2 m Net

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Written by: Administrator

Category: Ensign

Published: 27 August 2026

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VE8RT in Action (YARS Photo)

There is a weekly VHF radio net every Sunday at 9:00 PM local time on the local repeater system here in Yellowknife.  The repeater is also an IRLP node 1642 and check-ins are welcome to call in. 

• Sunday, 9:00 PM Local Time
• VE8YK/R (146.940 MHz with -600 kHz offset with a 100 Hz sub-audible tone) based in Yellowknife (IRLP was verified as functional as of 2023-08-02 by VE8IR and M0XWS and VE8RT); and
• VE8RAE/R (145.150 MHz with -600 kHz offset) based in Behchokǫ̀ (formerly Rae).

  Read more: Weekly 2 m Net

ISED Antenna Tower Consultation

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Written by: Administrator

Category: Ensign

Published: 27 August 2026

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[From RAC]

For immediate release | June 15, 2026

Canada’s radio regulator, Innovation, Science and Development Canada (ISED), released a consultation on their proposals for changes to their policy on antennas and towers. 

These proposals will speed up and make easier the processes required to get permission to erect antenna systems.  The changes were designed to make things easier for commercial telecommunications providers, but they offer many improvements to Radio Amateurs. 

Read more: ISED Antenna Tower Consultation