Walter Hannam at the Spark Transmitter in Antarctica (Sourced from Australian Antarctic Division Archives)
The Radio and Electronics Association of Southern Tasmania Inc. has been invited to participate in the Australian Antarctic Festival.
WIRELESS COMMUNICATIONS. AN ESSENTIAL PART OF MAWSON’S AUSTRALASIAN ANTARCTIC EXPEDITION 1911-14
Members of the Radio and Electronics Association of Southern Tasmania (REAST) will be at the Antarctic Expo on Saturday 24 and Sunday 25 August with displays of radio equipment similar to that used by Antarctic expeditioners over the decades.
There will also be a Morse Code station at which you can send and receive messages using the same communications method as that used by Walter Hannam and Sidney Jeffryes during the Expedition.
Hannam and Jeffryes communicated using the most modern technology of the day, Morse Code, and used a 1.5 kilowatt ‘spark’ transmitter. Hannam helped to set up the wireless stations on Macquarie Island en route to Antarctica and then established the first radio to operate on the Antarctic continent in the winter of 1912.
The first message to be received from Antarctica and acknowledged by the station on the Queen’s Domain (our REAST Clubrooms) in Hobart, via the Hannam-installed station on Macquarie Island, was on 25 September 1912.
The Festival Program can be found here – https://www.mawsons-huts.org.au/2024-festival-program/
The event is free so why not come down and have a look.
73, REAST Committee.