Author: K5ZD

It was an exciting surprise when Dmitri, RA9USU, appeared in the CQ WW DX Contest SSB 2013 from 7O2A in Socotra Island in Yemen. This was a rare one!

The country files used by the most common logging software have Yemen in Asia and zone 21.  The operator at 7O2A was sending zone 37.

As the logs came in, we needed to make a decision on how to score contacts with 7O2A. Is it zone 21 or 37? Is it Africa or Asia?

A little research about Socotra revealed:

• WAC says Asia, based upon an RSGB request in 1954
• RSGB Prefix Guide (2012, G4BWP) says Africa
• RSGB IOTA says Africa, AF-028
• Wikipedia says it ‘may be considered to be in Africa’

Given the above, we have decided to score Socotra island as zone 37 in Africa.  The country files used to perform the log checking have been set to score 7O2A this way.

Since the operator sent zone 37 for every QSO, anyone logging 7O2A in zone 21, will have an exchange error and lose the contact.

If you are interested in learning more about the unique environment found only on Socotra, please see this article by National Geographic (http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2012/06/socotra/white-text) and accompanying photographs (http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2012/06/socotra/melford-moffett-photography).

 

 

 

We are pleased to announce a new searchable score database containing all CQ WW DX Contest entries from 1989 to 2012! There are 104,078 SSB entries and 96,139 CW entries in the database. You can view the database here: http://www.cqww.com/score_db.htm

The historical database project has been lead by John Golomb, N2NC. John recruited a team of volunteers to help with the data entry. The CQ WW database would not exist without their time and effort. The data entry team includes: AA4NU, AD1C, JK3GAD, K1EA, KB9OWD, N3RD, N5DX, NO5W, OH6NIO, ON7SS, PD2R, W2JU, and N2NC.

Data from the past 5 years were obtained directly from the log checking output. Data for the prior 4 years came from files provided by K3EST. Anything earlier was typed in by hand from the magazine results. That represents many hours looking at very small print while typing in thousands of call signs and numbers! We owe these guys a round of applause.

The on-line score database will be the official record for the CQ WW Contest. Despite our best efforts, with 200,000 line scores, there are sure to be some errors.

Step 1 – Check our work

You can help us by taking a few minutes to check that all of your own scores are correct.

1. Go to http://www.cqww.com/score_db.htm
2. Type your call in the search box and click Go.
3. You will see a list of every contest entry where your call sign was used or listed as an operator. Please check that the country (call area) and zone is correct for each entry.
4. If you find any errors or have questions, contact us at: https://cqww.com/contact.
5. If you were involved in a multi-op, are all of the operator call signs included?

Step 2 – Enjoy

We have come up with a few tools to help you look back through the history of CQ WW entries.

View the number of log entries for each year by country: http://www.cqww.com/stats.htm

All time records by world, continent, or country: http://www.cqww.com/records.htm (These records are automatically generated from the score database.)

Zone records: http://www.cqww.com/recordsbyzone.htm

Yearly winners for any category and country: http://www.cqww.com/winners.htm (Its fun to look back and see who has stood at the top of the podium.)

Download a certificate. All entries received by the deadline in 2012 have the option to produce an Adobe pdf file participation certificate.

One fun thing to do before the contest is to filter the database to show all scores in your target entry category. Then use this information to set a goal. For example, see if you can reach the top ten all time scores in your zone or country. Look at the band breakdowns to get an idea of how conditions change as we progress through the solar cycle.

Notes

Band breakdowns are only available for scores in 2007 and later. We have also entered breakdowns for some of the world top scores from the magazine writeups. If you would like to have band breakdowns included for your scores, dig up the UBN report that you received for your entry and send it  at: https://cqww.com/contact. We need the UBN report because it has the QSO and multiplier totals that were calculated during the log checking process.

John and his team will continue adding more years to the database. If you would like to help, please contact us at: https://cqww.com/contact.