Amateur Radio offers such a wide range of activities that everyone can find a favorite niche. As one of the few truly international hobbies, ham radio offers the ability to communicate with other similarly licensed aficionados all over the world. The competition of “radiosport” — just to pick one activity many hams enjoy — helps operators to improve their skills and stations. Further, ham radio offers opportunities to serve the public by supporting communication in disasters and emergencies, and it’s a platform for scientific experimentation.
Ham radio has extended its horizon into space. The International Space Station boasts a ham radio station, and most ISS crew members are Amateur Radio licensees. Thanks to the Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) program, properly equipped hams can talk directly with NASA astronauts in space. Hams contact each other through Earth-orbiting satellites designed and built by other radio amateurs, and they even bounce radio signals off the moon and to other hams back on Earth.
Hams talk with one another from cars, while hiking or biking in the mountains, from remote campsites or while boating. Through a plethora of activities, hams learn a lot, establish lifelong friendships and, perhaps most important, have a lot of fun. Along the way, radio amateurs often contribute some of the genius behind the latest technological innovations. In all likelihood, you’re already a ham or at least have experimented with radio and electronics yourself and are thinking about becoming one. This Handbook is an invaluable resource that reveals and explains the “mysteries” governing electronics in general and in radio — or wireless — communication in particular, especially as it pertains to Amateur Radio.
