Icom IC-756PROIII Keeps 30th Anniversary Clipperton DXpedition on the Air

The 2008 Clipperton DXpedition is now on the air! And Icom radios are the rig of choice for this latest ham radio adventure. Six Icom IC-756PROIII transceivers were provided to the 21 member Clipperton team who are now working around the clock to log as many amateur radio contacts (aka: QSOs) as they can. The 24-7 endeavor began March 9 and is scheduled to wrap up March 17th.

2008 marks the 30th anniversary of the first Clipperton DXpedition. The 2008 crew is all new. There have been a small handful of Clipperton DXpeditions since, the last taking place in 2000. FO0AAA was the call in 2000, and over 75,000 QSOs were made, using an earlier generation of the Icom IC-756PRO series transceivers in use on the island today.

Clipperton Island is a remote, uninhabited atoll in the eastern Pacific Ocean, 10°18′N, 109°13′W. The heat, humidity and invasive sand of this tropical location is as inhospitable to electronics as it is to most life forms. Yet in 2000 the Icom radios performed without issue, and 2008 is (so far! cross fingers!) proving to be the same. Note the latest report (3/12/08) from the team’s Website, and the lack of any remarks about transceiver breakdowns:

Q's now total 40,573. Yesterday we had three major thunderstorms that tore up the camp. Generators in both the SSB and CW camps went down and took repairs to get back up. Winds toppled antennas and they had to be repaired. We lost our 15 meter SVDA in the SSB camp which was destroyed by the winds. We will attempt to straight out or replace the broken aluminum today. Two of our CW keyers went down and we cannot repair them. So our operators are sending cw the good old fashioned way but it's reducing our q rate. Morale is high and despite the weather we are all working as hard as we can. The thunderstorms are also causing our noise levels in the night to be extremely high. These thunderstorms have been increasing in size and frequency for the past several days. Although they blow through in about 15 minutes, they dump on average about an inch of rain or more and are accompanied by very strong gusting winds.

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