Featured Items
Notice of Annual General Meeting
- Details
- Category: Society Governance
- Hits: 2211
[2025-04-23] In accordance with Part G, section 1 of the Constitution of the Yellowknife Amateur Radio Society, the Executive has announced that the Annual General Meeting of the Society will be held as follows:
- Place: Javaroma on Franklin (50th Avenue) [Nortwest Tower]
- Time: 0900 h
- Date: Sunday, 10 August 2025
We need a quorum of 3. This is your chance to take a leadership role in the Society.
Report of 2023 Wildfires and Response by YARS
- Details
- Category: Civil Defence
- Hits: 9079
[2024-06-17] From about May to October 2023 a series of wildfires occurred across the Northwest Territories. The wildfires were wide-spread geographically and coincided with abnormally high temperatures and a major drought. Significant loss of forests occurred as did loss to private property including homes and infrastructure (roads, fibre optic cables, hydro-electrical transmission lines etc.). The community of Enterprise was consumed. Fort Smith, Hay River, Enterprise, Kátł'odeeche First Nation, Yellowknife, Behchokǫ̀ etc. were all evacuated amongst other locations. Fortunately there was no direct loss of life.
WordPerfect on Linux
- Details
- Category: Technical Notes
- Hits: 1512
Retrofuturism - Anachronistic Technology and HAM Radio

The figure above may seem rather silly. It shows WordPerfect 8.0 for UNIX running - roughly the equivalent of WordPerfect 4.2 for MSDOS - mid to late 1980s. WordPerfect 6.0 for MSDOS is shown running in the DOSBOX, an emulator for MSDOS - late 1990s). Finally WordPerfect X.13 is shown running in a virtual machine that is running Windows 7. All of these are running under Linux Mint 21.x. The laptop on which they are running is an old ASUS X55U, with motherboard manufactured in 2013.
Aurora Borealis
- Details
- Category: Technical Notes
- Hits: 2448
What is the Aurora?

The aurora borealis or Northern Lights is an atmospheric phenomenon that occurs in the northern hemisphere of the planet. It also occurs in the southern hemisphere where it is known as the aurora australis. Aurora are known to exist on comets, brown dwarfs, other planets and on some moons. Aurora are caused by solar wind interacting with magnetic fields and atmospheric particles. Atmospheric particles become energized and form what is known as plasma. Plasma is energized or ionized gas. It is the fourth state of matter and has been so identified since about 1972. Yes, your high school teachers who taught you the three states of matter were...well...not current in their physics. You see plasma every day when you see the sun, an operating fluorescent light or an operating neon light.