Yesterday, I had the opportunity to celebrate International Marconi Day by operating as W2GSB, the official event station for the Great South Bay Amateur Radio Club. It was my first time ever operating at a club station — and also my first time getting on the air with a digital mode!
We originally planned to operate on voice, but band conditions weren’t the best. After trying for a while, everyone ended up jumping over to FT8 to make the most of the day — and it turned out to be a great call.
I spent the afternoon working the 15-meter station on FT8 using a club-owned ICOM IC-7600. It was an incredible learning experience, and honestly, a lot of fun.
Breaking Down the Event
Our event setup included three stations:
- 10 meters: 30 QSOs on FT8 (plus 8 QSOs on CW)
- 15 meters: 80 QSOs on FT8 (plus 4 QSOs on CW)
- 20 meters: 43 QSOs on FT8
I operated the 15m FT8 station alongside two other operators — including Chris, KY0TO. I arrived around 12:00 PM and spent the first two hours learning with Chris how to operate FT8. At 2:00 PM, it was my turn to jump on the air and run the station for the rest of the event.
Over the next couple of hours, I was able to log a steady stream of FT8 contacts, helping the station reach 80 total QSOs on 15 meters. One of the highlights was successfully working special IARU stations like AO100IARU, OP100A, and AO5IARU — a really cool surprise during the event!
First-Time Milestones
This was a day of a lot of firsts for me:
- My first time operating under a club station
- My first time being part of an officially recognized event station
- My first time operating using FT8 or any digital mode
It felt great to get a taste of how an event like this runs — from logging contacts efficiently to seeing how the team worked together. Everyone was super welcoming, and it made me even more excited to keep growing in the hobby.
Final Thoughts
International Marconi Day celebrates one of the pioneers of wireless communication, and it was pretty amazing to be a part of it — even in my small way. Getting to operate W2GSB and connect with operators around the world felt like a real milestone in my ham radio journey.
Looking forward to even more events like this in the future. 73!
– Daniel // W2DIY