WVARA’s monthly meeting will be  on Wednesday, November 11, at 7pm via Zoom.  Please contact a WVARA board member for Zoom Information.

At this month’s meeting, Keith Snyder (KI6BDR) will give a virtual presentation on the Russian Woodpecker Over the Horizon Radar – A Real Blast from the Past.   I’m really looking forward to this one since many of us older hams remember encountering this signal on-the-air.

In addition, Steve KC6ZKT will give us an update on plans for Winter Field Day and how you can get involved.   (Winter Field Day will be January 30/31).
Jim, K6EIWVARA Vice President

Hidden deep in a serene forest yet taller than the clouds, standing in surreal beauty is an antenna array like none other on earth, having an aperture area greater than 15 U.S. football fields. One of the great wonders of the world – a top secret Soviet HF radar, so secret that even the name is uncertain, for it had many. It was the Russian Woodpecker. It was the Steel Yard. It was Duga.

The story of this top secret place is one of mystery and intrigue. Now abandoned, a rusting testament to man’s cold war hubris, almost all popular accounts on the web are seriously flawed – victims of deliberate disinformation. Where did it come from? What did it do? Did it transmit? Did it receive? Was it the first of three, or the third of two?

Keith Snyder, KI6BDR, has been busy reverse engineering to uncover truth before time erases history. Keith shows visible engineering clues that reveal the mission and correct the history of the huge “Duga 3” antenna array. The Duga 3 is located a few kilometers from the Chernobyl nuclear power plant site. Although it has fallen into disrepair, it stands today due only to a hasty exit forced by radiation from the Chernobyl nuclear accident. The nuclear accident ironically protected the array from dismantlement, a reprieve from all but the ravages of time. The antenna array today attracts tourists who visit Chernobyl. It is one of the 8th Wonders of the World due to its titanic size.