Greetings from the Indian Ocean!

My merchant marine ship is enroute from Diego Garcia (grid MI62) to Charleston, SC (FM03) and is taking the Pacific route this time. I've got the FT897D and FT817ND with the Arrow-2 with me, and I'll be QRV from quite a few wet grids along the way. Unfortunately, my XYL Cori isn't along for the ride; she's at home recovering from shoulder surgery and getting ready for our next road trip.

The grid fields that I expect to travel through while enroute to the Left Coast and hopefully operate from include: MI, NI, OI, OJ, PJ, PK, QK (24 hours at Guam), QL, RL, RM, AM, BM, CM. and DM.

My job is seven days a week for four months straight, which is why I get long vacations for those long road trips! The downside is that I have to miss passes that occur during the normal daytime working hours. I can sometimes get away at key pass times, so AO27 and HO68 (when it's QRV again) are possible, but can't be predicted.

Another downside is that with an easterly voyage of this length, we'll be going through a lot of time zones. (We're currently at GMT +6.) We'll go through 10 time zones before we hit the USA, and at an average of a time zone every three days (and losing an hour of sleep each time as well as gain a day somewhere along the line), the body will start to adjust to the new time just when we have to set clocks ahead again. It's going to get old very fast!

The majority of passes that I'll be on will be in the late afternoon and early evening, so AO51, FO29, and AO7 Mode B will be the focus. Early morning AO7 passes will occasionally be on the plate too.

Likewise, I should be on late evening VO52 passes but likely only once we've crossed the Int'l Date Line into the eastern Pacific. I have to set up on the ship's helicopter deck that normally has no lighting and isn't patrolled. The ship is very, very safe, but since we're at sea, I have to pay extra attention to wherever I am outside on the decks especially after dark. My LED headband lamp up gives me pretty good light up there, but it would be way too easy to disappear over the railing, and it's a big ocean!

We'll be off the coast of southern California by the end of February and should be there for about 10 days before we resume our voyage towards Charleston. Our route will then take us through the Panama Canal and northward around Cuba towards Jacksonville (EM90) for another stop at the end of March; after a week or so there, we'll finish the trip with a quick run to Charleston where I'll sign off the ship in April. Cori will meet me at the ship, and we'll head home to Panama City, Florida.

I've applied for my IARP permit for Panama so that, barring unforeseen regulations, I'll be able to operate whatever passes occur as we transit the Canal. It's way too early to know if we'll actually stop at Panama, but I'll be ready with the gear to operate from the country itself for those who need DXCC credit.

I'm cut off from the internet for the next three months, so I will not have access to my regular AOL e-mail account. Any queries or sked suggestions should be sent to me at the following shipboard address for now: james.t.clary.civ(at)msc.navy.mil. The address obviously has a lot of dots, but they have to be in there to get through.

As always, I'll send regular updates on my trip's progress to the BB.

CU on the birds!

73,

Jim, ND9M / VQ9JC

Grid NI02