September Meeting Report

“One of the best talks for a long time” was the flavour of many comments heard following the CARA meeting on 17th September.  At that meeting we heard John 2E0GCR relate the story of his trip across the Atlantic in a rowing boat!  Needless to say not any old rowing boat but a special purpose one designed for the trip.

The boat was designed to hold a full crew of eight but they set off, towards the end of 2014, with just seven, reduced after a few days to six when one crew member had to airlifted off due to a severe wound infection.  The video clips of the airlift were exciting to say the least with the helicopter crewman swinging violently on the end of the winch cable as he tried to land on the boat.

John described the hardships encountered, eg a diet of mainly curried meals and during the night of being hit in the face by flying fishing appearing out of nowhere.  There were compensations such as the beautiful night sky complete with shootings stars – no street-light pollution to spoil the view in  mid-Atlantic!

A very interesting meeting which held our attention throughput and to judge by the seemingly endless number of questions one which provoked much curiosity and admiration of the crew’s endeavours.  A full report on the meeting will appear in October’s CARA News.

Unfortunately, because of the great interest in John’s talk, there was insufficient time left for the second part of the talk on Smith Charts by Giles G0NXA, so this will be rescheduled for another meeting.

Many thanks to John 2E0GCR for such as fascinating and enthralling talk.

Derek G3NKS