An advance party of sorts was in American Samoa this week, scouting possible location for the upcoming W1AW/KH8 operation. The team expects the ARRL Centennial W1AW portable operation from American Samoa to get underway November 2 and continue for about 12 days.

John Kennon, N7CQQ, Paul Playford, W8AEF, and Clifford Hauser, KD6XH, arrived in American Samoa (KH8) ahead of the rest of the W1AW/KH8 crew to get the lay of the land, before heading over to Samoa (5W) to operate in the CQ World Wide DX SSB contest over the October 25-26 (UTC) weekend.

The rest of the W1AW/KH8 team expects to arrive late on October 31. The W1AW;/KH8 operation will wrap up sometime on November 14 (American Samoa is UTC – 11 hours).

From October 8 until October 21, W1AW/KH0 was on the air from The Radio Space of Tinian, on Tinian Island in the Northern Mariana Islands. Ten operators from the US and Japan supported that activity. There are nine operators on the W1AW/KH8 team, but not all are planning to stay for the duration. In addition to N7CQQ, W8AEF, and KD6XH, team members include Mike Goode, N9NS; Jay Slough, K4ZLE; Pete Meyer, N0FW; Rod Klug, KE0A; Atsuo Akuma, 5W1SA, and Derek Cox, G3KHZ. According to N9NS, these operators may be joined by “locals” Mike Homsany, AH8E, Kendra Pinsker, AH8W, and possibly Uti Gandy, KS6FO, the widow of Larry Gandy, AH8LG.

W1AW/KH8 operations are expected to take place from two locations — from the station of Uti Gandy, KS6FO, and the late AH8LG, and from the Maliu Mai Beach Resort on the beach on the southwestern part of the island, which has hosted other KH8 operations. The international team will begin W1AW/KH8 operations from the two sites once all the antennas have been put up and/or repaired. Plans call for three or four stations on all bands from 1.8 through 28 MHz.

As with other Centennial QSO Party contacts, confirmation will be via Logbook of The World (LoTW). Stations who have contacted W1AW/KH0 or W1AW/KH8 may be able to request cards directly or via the bureau through use of an Online QSL Request System (OQRS). QSLs cards are not necessary, however, and in due course, all QSLs will be sent via the bureau. — Thanks to The Daily DX