Make sure to mark your calendar for the 2020 Ohio State Parks On The Air (OSPOTA) contest – September 12, 2020. The contest is always held on the first Saturday following the Labor Day holiday. Each year this event has grown and we anticipate another year of growth with even more participating Amateur Radio Operators.

Let me remind you that the OSPOTA contest was conceived with three main goals in mind:

To promote public awareness of amateur radio and Ohio’s beautiful state parks system;

To contribute to the recognition that Ohio has a very diverse and wonderful ecology;

To promote camaraderie within the ranks of Ohio’s Amateur Radio Operators

Your participation has allowed these goals to be achieved. We agree it is a lot of fun to get out in a natural setting with your radio and see how well you can do at working operators in the beautiful Ohio State Parks.

This will be the 13th annual OSPOTA – Make plans now to be active in OSPOTA 2020.

The 2020 files will be posted both here on the OSPOTA web site and the OSPOTA IO Group site around the end of 2019.

Don’t forget – we have an OSPOTA E-mail Group located at: https://groups.io/g/OSPOTA

The OSPOTA IO Group page is used for messaging and sharing of information about OSPOTA for all the fans and participants in the OSPOTA contest. The E-mail Group is where the action is.

Since we do allow spotting to encourage more contacts during OSPOTA, Facebook is being used before and during the contest for instant updates and to share stories and photos.

As the contest draws near, we’ll be posting on the OSPOTA E-mail Group page the anticipated ‘who’s going to be at what Ohio State Park’ or ‘Planned Park’ list as we have in past years. Send your planned park activation information to PlannedParks@ospota.org . Please, include the call sign that will be used and the Ohio State Park you plan to be at. If your plans change, just let us know and we’ll update the list.

Notes: Some Ohio State Parks are being managed by local park systems, but they are still listed and considered to be Ohio State Parks according to ODNR (Quail Hollow & Tinkers Creek).

So – pick a park and make your plans now for OSPOTA 2020 !!!!!! Take care & 73 from the entire OSPOTA contest Committee,

Tom, KB8UUZ OSPOTA Chairman OSPOTA

Questions? Email: INFO@ospota.org

When the OSPOTA contest is over, send Logs and Summary Sheets to: Logs@ospota.org