ALERT NEWSLETTER – December 2025

Hi Everyone,

Welcome to the 222nd edition of the ALERT Newsletter!

The 222nd edition almost became the 000th edition as while I was typing it, the laptop went berserk and seemed to have a mind of its own. The night before I had watched an episode of 911 Nashville, where some ne’er-do-wells were hacking into the system for fun and profit. So, I switched to airplane mode, and it kept on misbehaving.

I then noticed that the sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss button was stuck, so I rebooted the computer and the sssssssssssssituation wassssss the sssssame. So, I shut it down, turned it over and gently beat the stew out of it. Then I sprayed the keyboard with a can of compressed air and froze the poor thing. I waited a day for it to defrost and dry out and gingerly rebooted it, and seeing no tendrils of smoke or any stray ssssses, here we are, back in the sssaddle again!

The other biggest news of the month is that due to the chaos which resulted from the recent budgetary jousting in Washington, NOAA has had to cancel this year’s SKYWARN Appreciation Day. They feel that the “necessary time and resources required to plan a comprehensive national event for SKYWARN Recognition Day 2025 are no longer available.”

Per the ARRL “The NWS will work with ARRL and SKYWARN spotters to brainstorm ideas to redevelop a spotter appreciation event in 2026.”

“ARRL is proud of the continued partnership with the National Weather Service to promote and recognize SKYWARN and the volunteers around the country. We look forward to working together to revitalize and promote SKYWARN Recognition Day again next year,” said Josh Johnston, KE5MHV, ARRL Director of Emergency Management.

Barring unforeseen circumstances, the next SKYWRN Appreciation Day will be held Saturday December 5, 2026.

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ALERT Christmas Party!

The 2025 ALERT Christmas Party will take place on Tuesday December 9th at 7PM during our regular meeting time.

There will be food, non-alcoholic drinks, desserts, and other goodies. Come have Christmas dinner with your ALERT family!

If you plan to bring a dish, please let Johnnie know at wxjohnnie@gmail.com and tell him who you are, what you will bring (so we don’t end up with 18 fruitcakes and no beans) and how many will attend.

Hope to see you there!

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VOACAP For Ham Radio

Amateur radio has been a fascination for me for 48 years. My ham radio story consists of many chapters, such as being involved in traffic and emergency nets, ALERT, SKYWARN, ARES or just getting on the radio and seeing who I can find and how far my modest equipment can be heard. I’m just as excited about ham radio today as I was in the beginning.

Currently, in addition to ALERT and SKYWARN, I am prowling the High Frequency bands.
Though I’m far from being a “DX Baron”, the fascination that I can talk to someone across a state, a continent or an ocean still fascinates me after all these years. Whether I am working actual “DX” or as I call it “Domestic DX”, since talking 2000 miles to Colombia and 2000 miles to Seattle is the same distance. Just one counts as “DX” and the other doesn’t.

For my purposes I use the literal definition of DX – “Distance”. How far away is the other station? For seeing how far my signal can reach, on what band, under what conditions, and with what antenna and radio is my goal.

This serves some very practical purposes. One, it is fun, two, whether HF or VHF radio, It helps keep me fresh in the usage and the nuances of the equipment and conditions, which could be vital in an emergency. For skills and knowledge are the most perishable of commodities. They tend to quietly fade away just as the charges of batteries do. When you need them, will they still be there?

One mistake many are making, is getting radios for the proverbial “SHTF”, and then neglecting getting licensed and using them regularly so they can learn what does and doesn’t work and how communicate effectively. Then a different type of “SHTF” is encountered – “Shoot, How’s This Function???” Which is not question you want to be asking when your house is now a debris field and you are in trouble. You need to learn this skill beforehand.

One radio tool I recently discovered is a VOACAP – the Voice Of America Coverage Analysis Program. VOACAP is a free professional online tool that predicts ham radio propagation from 80 to 10 Meters and down to 2.000 MHz in the Marine version at the upper edge of the 160 meter band.

The program was originally developed by the Voice of America to help with their international broadcasts, and though it bears the VOA name, it is now separate from the VOA. So, if the VOA closes its doors, the program will live on.

VOACAP provides simulated propagation conditions, factoring in the time of day, desired frequency, solar activity and distance between stations.

VOACAP comes in three versions.

The ham version covers 80 – 10 Meters, may be found at VOACAP Online for Ham Radio
The Marine version covers from 2 – 25 MHz, may be found at VOACAP Online for Marine HF
The CB Version covers from 26 – 28 MHz may be found at VOACAP Online for 11M

The program is complex, but there is a quickie method that even a dummy like me can use.

To use this program, you click on the version you wish to use and a zoomable map appears.

You set your location by zooming in on your location and positioning the red marker on the map and then zoom out.

Set the blue marker over the area you wish to contact. For example, let’s say Spain on 15 Meters.

There will be a green line connecting the two locations, which is the signal short path, and a dotted line showing the long path in the opposite direction. Also shown are the real time day/night areas of the Earth, and the gray line separating the two, which signals sometimes prefer.

To the right of the map, you can select the operating mode you intend to use, power level and the antenna.

Modes given are AM, SSB, CW and digital modes. The modes giving the best chances for a successful contact are from least to best, AM, SSB, CW and digital modes FT4, FT8 & WSPR.
Power level choices from .0 to 20,000 watts, remembering that hams are limited to 1500 watts,

I usually choose CW and 100 watts and skip the “antenna” setting and general propagation settings under “Settings”, as they are too detailed for my casual use,

By clicking Prop Charts, a pop up window appears on the left side of the screen with multicolored lines, a decibel scale to the left, a signal strength scale to the right and a timescale at the bottom. A dropdown menu will let you pick the band you want, which this example is 15 Meters.

There are four things I am looking for on this chart :

The blue line, which is “Rel” or “Circuit Reliability”.
The orange line that hints at the Maximum Useable Frequency. (The higher the line, the better).
The green line that indicates predicted signal strength.
The shaded gray area.

The gray area depicts the variation of the predicted signal strength via the short path. The upper edge hints at the strongest signal you might encounter under near perfect conditions, while the lower edge reveals the minimum signal strength you can expect under normal or average conditions.

When the gray zone widens, uncertainty creeps in. A gap or spread of 40 – 50 dB (using the scale on the left side of the chart) means VOACAP is uncertain of the propagation chances. As the gap narrows, the program’s confidence is higher. If the bottom of the gray area is also high, with a white area underneath, it indicates a strong signal should be expected.

The best chances for communications are when you see a high lower edge of the gray zone, a narrow gray zone, and high blue, orange and green lines.

As I write this it is indicating that roughly from 12:00z to 16:00z the band should be open to Spain. If the bottom of the gray area had a white area, the probability is good to very good.

A second indicator is CAP Wheel to the right, which gives a visual indication of expected propagation band by band of the entire HF ham spectrum over a 24 hour period. Click this and a bullseye chart will appear with each band. 10 Meters is on the outer circle, and then you can go inward band by band to 80 Meters on the inside circle. (For 160 Meters I use the same method with the Marine version, which goes down to just above the 160 Meter band).

This chart tells you what bands will be open, when and the percent chance. By moving the cursor to the desired band and the darkest color on the graph you will have the UT time starting on the hour, the band and your percentage. With this indicator the time is narrower than with the first method.

The third indicator is the ITUR Wheel. This is similar to the CAP Wheel, but uses predictions in accordance with ITU recommendations. Click on it and a similar bullseye appears, and you use the same method. For me this chart seems much more optimistic than the other two methods and shows that in addition to the 12:00z to 16:00z, in the wee hours of the morning 40, 60 and then 80 Meters will open to Spain from 23:00z to 10:00z.

I factor in the three methods, and mentally average them out.

That’s the quick and easy method. It is a deep, deep program in which you can change and factor in many other variables. For a deeper dive I recommend reading the online manual VOACAP_Manual.pdf

That 23:00z to 10:00z window of opportunity we predicted brings up another factor I’ll call the “human factor”.

What time of day will it be where you are and at your target location and will anyone in their right mind be up at that late at night or that early in the morning talking on the radio?

Just as 2 meters has a traffic pattern rotating around work, school and sleep, so it is true everywhere. You can’t talk to anyone if they are all asleep.

To help factor in the time I use UTC to CDT Converter – Convert Universal Time to Central Time – World Time Buddy which gives UTC time, my time and I can specify anywhere in the world and see if “yes the band is open, but only insomniacs are around” or “catch em before they go to bed!”

Other propagation programs worth exploring are:

24-hour prediction
DR2W DX Propagation
Online Rec. P.533-14 Propagation Prediction Tool

The question you may ask is does VOACAP and these other tools really work?

Well, recently they said I should be able to reach Brazil, and I worked PY4LS, 4727 miles away in Sao Paulo, Brazil and PY3PZ, 4892 miles away in Sao Gabriel, Brazil via transequatoral propagation using CW on 12 & 10 Meters. It also said I should be able to reach Japan, and I had a nice lengthy contact with JK4CHT, 6985 miles away near Osaka, via multihop reflection off the F2 layer of the ionosphere using CW on 12 Meters. That’s using 100 watts, into a vertical antenna.

So, either these programs work, or I was lucky, or a little bit of both, which is probably the case.

Try these programs out and see what you think.

Happy DX!

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Mark’s Almanac

December was the tenth Roman Month, from whence it gets its name, “decem” meaning “ten”. Among many Native American tribes it was called “the Moon of Clacking Rocks”, as it was the time when they prepared and manufactured stone tools, implements and weapons, since the growing season was over, and bad weather prevented them from hunting.

December is the cloudiest month of the year, with only 40 to 60% of possible sunshine poking through the clouds. It is also the stormiest month of the year for the Continental US & the Gulf. By “stormy” meaning large-scale storms, not necessarily the tornadic storms that they bring, even though we are still in our Second Tornado Season.

A region of heavy rainfall usually forms from Texas to Northwest Florida to Tennessee and Arkansas. Cold waves bringing rain, snow, ice and occasionally tornadoes, sweep across the region.

Average precipitation in Birmingham is 4.47” of rainfall and 0.1” of snowfall.

December can be cloudy and cold, and, then it can swing into spring like warmth, luring plants to bloom early, only to have the frosts and freezes return and the plants are “nipped in the bud”.

Hurricane season is now “officially” over, however Mother Nature sometimes throws a surprise in to make life interesting.

From 1851 – 2024 there have been 19 Tropical Storms and from 1822 to 2022 there have been 8 Category 1 hurricanes, but none have ever struck the United States.

Two notable December hurricanes are:

Hurricane Alice of 1954, which is the only known Atlantic hurricane to span two calendar years and one of only two named Atlantic tropical cyclones, along with Tropical Storm Zeta of 2005, to do so.

Alice developed on December 30, 1954 from a trough of low pressure in the central Atlantic Ocean in an area of unusually favorable conditions. The storm moved southwestward and gradually strengthened to reach hurricane status. After passing through the Leeward Islands on January 2, 1955, Alice reached peak winds of 90 mph before encountering cold air and turning to the southeast. It dissipated on January 6 over the southeastern Caribbean Sea.

The last December hurricane to occur was Hurricane Epsilon during the 2005 season, the year in which we ran out of hurricane names. The year also featured Tropical Storm Zeta, the latest forming Tropical Storm which formed on December 30, 2005 and lasted until January 7, 2006.

Days continue to grow shorter as the Sun’s angle above the noonday horizon steadily decreases from 34.6 degrees at the beginning of the month to 33.0 degrees at Winter Solstice on December 21 and then the angle begins to lift reaching 33.4 degrees on New Year’s Eve,

Daylight decreases from 10 hours 8 minutes on December 1 to 9 hours 58 minutes at Winter Solstice and then increases to 10 hours 01 minutes on December 31

Sunrise and Sunset times for Birmingham are:

December 1 Sunrise 6:32 AM Sunset 4:40 PM
December 15 Sunrise 6:42 AM Sunset 4:42 PM
December 21 Sunrise 6:46 AM Sunset 4:44 PM
December 31 Sunrise 6:40 AM Sunset 4:51 PM

Looking skyward, at the beginning of the month, the Sun, magnitude -26.8 is in Ophiuchus The Serpent Bearer.

Mercury, magnitude -0.5, in Scorpius, The Scorpion, is visible in the morning sky, rising at 4:58 AM CST – 1 hour and 33 minutes before the Sun – and will reach an altitude of 11° above the south-eastern horizon before fading from view as dawn breaks at around 6:04 AM CST.

He will reach his highest altitude in the morning sky on December 6, reaching 18° above the Eastern horizon shining brightly at -0.5 magnitude, and then reach his greatest separation from the Sun, or Greatest Western Elongation on December 7.

This is the best time to view Mercury since he will be at his highest point above the horizon in the morning sky. Look for the planet low in the eastern sky just before sunrise.

He will then begin steadily retreating towards the Sun.

By midmonth he will rise at 5:08 AM CST – 1 hour and 33 minutes before the Sun – and reach an altitude of 12° above the south-eastern horizon before fading from view as dawn breaks at around 6:19 AM CST.

Mercury will disappear into the glow of the Sun on December 22.

Venus, magnitude –3.9, in Ophiuchus, The Serpent Bearer, is hidden from view as she moves behind the Sun.

Earth and her Moon, magnitude -4.0, as viewed from the Sun, is in Orion, The Hunter.

Mars, with his moons Phobos and Deimos, magnitude +1.5, in Sagittarius, The Archer, is hidden from view as he is passing behind the Sun.

Dwarf Planet Ceres, magnitude +8.3, is in Cetus, The Sea Monster.

Jupiter, and his 97 moons and (invisible from Earth) ring, magnitude -2.6, is in Gemini, The Twins,
dominates the late evening and early morning skies.

At the beginning of the month, he will become accessible around 8:31 PM CST, when it reaches an altitude of 7° above the eastern horizon. He will reach his highest point in the sky at 2:49 AM CST, 77° above the southern horizon. He will be lost to dawn twilight around 6:14 AM CST, 43° above the western horizon.

By midmonth he becomes accessible around 7:30 PM CST, when he reaches an altitude of 7° above the eastern horizon. He will then reach his highest point in the sky at 1:49 AM CST, 78° above the southern horizon. He will be lost to dawn twilight around 6:24 AM CST, 28° above the western horizon.

By the end of the month, he will become accessible around 6:18 PM CST, when he reaches an altitude of 7° above the eastern horizon. He will then reach his highest point in the sky at 12:38 AM CST, 78° above the southern horizon. He will be lost to dawn twilight around 6:31 AM CST, 13° above the western horizon.

Saturn, magnitude 0.0, and his 274 moons and extensive debris ring system, in Aquarius, The Water Bearer, as an early evening object.

At the first of the month, he becomes accessible around 5:14 PM CST, 46° above the south-eastern horizon, as dusk fades to darkness. He will then reach his highest point in the sky at 6:47 PM CST, 52° above the southern horizon. He will continue to be observable until around 11:39 PM CST, when he sinks below 11° above the western horizon.

By midmonth he will become accessible around 5:17 PM CST, 51° above the southern horizon, as dusk fades to darkness. He will then reach his highest point in the sky at 5:53 PM CST, 52° above the southern horizon. He will continue to be observable until around 10:45 PM CST, when he sinks below 11° above the western horizon.

At months end he becomes visible around 5:26 PM CS, 51° above the southern horizon, as dusk fades to darkness. He will then sink towards the horizon, setting at 10:45 PM CST.

Saturn’s rings are nearly edge-on. In a telescope they look like a long, very faint needle piercing the bright globe. Their shadow on the planet is a stronger black line along the equator. The rings will start to reappear as the months pass, and won’t disappear again until 2040.

Uranus, magnitude +5.6, and his 29 moons and ring, in Taurus, The Bull, is currently an evening object, becoming accessible via binoculars around 5:41 PM CST, 21° above the eastern horizon, as dusk fades to darkness. He will then reach his highest point in the sky at 10:48 PM CST, 76° above the southern horizon. He will continue to be observable until around 3:56 AM CST, when he sinks below 21° above the western horizon.

By midmonth he will become accessible around 5:44 PM CST, 33° above the eastern horizon, as dusk fades to darkness. He will then reach its highest point in the sky at 9:50 PM CST, 76° above the southern horizon. He will continue to be observable until around 2:58 AM CST, when he sinks below 21° above the western horizon.

At month’s end he becomes accessible around 5:52 PM CST, at an altitude of 49° above the eastern horizon as dusk fades into darkness. He reaches his highest point in the sky at 8:45 PM CST, 75° above the southern horizon. He will continue to be observable until around 1:52 AM CST, when he sinks below 21° above the western horizon.

Neptune, magnitude +7.7, and his 16 moons and ring, in Pisces, The Fish, is currently visible in the evening sky via binoculars and telescopes.

At the first of the month, he becomes accessible at 5:41 PM CST, at an altitude of 50° above the south-eastern horizon as dusk fades into darkness. He will reach his highest point in the sky at 7:01 PM CST, 54° above the southern horizon. He will fade from view around 11:09 PM CST when he sinks below 21° above the western horizon.

Neptune will end his retrograde motion and resume his normal path across the sky on December 10.

At midmonth he will become accessible around 5:44 PM CST, 54° above the southern horizon, as dusk fades to darkness. He will then reach his highest point in the sky at 6:06 PM CST, 54° above the southern horizon. He will continue to be observable until around 10:14 PM CST, when he sinks below 21° above the western horizon.

At the end of the month, he becomes accessible around 5:52 CST PM, 53° above the south-western horizon, as dusk fades to darkness. He will then sink towards the horizon, setting at 11:02 PM CST.

Pluto, the largest Dwarf Planet, with his five moons shines at a dim 14.6 in Capricornus, The Sea Goat.

Dwarf Planet 136108 Haumea, her ring and moons Hiʻiaka and Namaka, shines at a faint magnitude of 17.3 in Bootes, The Herdsman.

Dwarf Planet 136472 Makemake with his moon S/2015 (136472) 1, nicknamed MK1 by the discovery team, shines faintly at magnitude +17.2 in Coma Berenices.

Dwarf Planet 136199 Eris, the second largest Dwarf Planet, and her moon Dysnomia, originally referred to as Xena and Gabrielle, is barely visible in the most powerful telescopes at magnitude +18.6 in Cetus the Sea Monster.

At least seven additional bodies with the preliminary criteria for identifying dwarf planets, and though not “officially” declared as such, are generally called dwarf planets by astronomers as well.

90482 Orcus, and his moon Vanth shines at magnitude 19.1 near Pegasus, The Winged Horse.

50000 Quaoar, his two rings and his moon Waywot shines at magnitude +18.6 in Orion, The Hunter.

90377 Sedna, the coldest, and at one time, the most distant known place in the Solar System, glows faintly at magnitude +20.7 in Taurus, The Bull.

225088 Gonggong, the third largest Dwarf Planet, originally nicknamed Snow White by the discovery team, and his moon Xiangli glows dimly at +21.5 magnitude in Pegasus, The Winged Horse.

2014 UZ224 nicknamed “DeeDee” for “Distant Dwarf” is 8.5 billion miles from the Sun, at magnitude +23.0 in Eridanus, The River.

120347 Salacia, and her moon Actaea glows at magnitude 20.7 in Sextans, The Sextant. Salacia is considered a “borderline” Dwarf Planet. Some astronomers saying she “most certainly is a Dwarf Planet”, while others disagreeing based on her size, saying she is too small to have compressed into a fully solid body, to have been resurfaced, or to have collapsed into “hydrostatic equilibrium”, that is to assume spherical shape like a planet.

“Dwarf Planet Candidate” 2017 OF201, magnitude 23.2 is in the constellation Triangulum, the Triangle.

Currently the most distant observable known object in the Solar System, an asteroid unofficially called Asteroid 2018 AG37, and nicknamed FarFarOut, glows at a barely detectable +25.5 magnitude in Lynx.

FarFarOut is currently 12,269,550,360 miles or in Light Time, 18 hours, 17 minutes and 45 seconds from Earth.

The most distant man-made object, Voyager 1, still operating after 48 years, 2 month and 15 days is 15,787,622,719 miles, or in Light Time, 23 hours, 32 minutes 31 Seconds from Earth as of 3:33 PM CST, November 20, 2025, sailing 38,027 miles per hour through Ophiuchus the Serpent Bearer.

Near Earth Object, asteroid 99942 Apophis, is expected to pass within 19,794 miles of the Earth on Friday, April 13, 2029.

Apophis, magnitude +20.6, in Ophiuchus, The Serpent Bearer, is 164,216,487 miles or 1241 days from the Earth as of 3:45 PM CST, November 20, 2025.

Asteroid 2024 YR4, which will pass though the Earth – Moon system on Wednesday, December 22, 2032, dimly glows at magnitude +30.3, in Virgo, The Virgin. It currently is 389,788,736 miles or 2694 days from Earth as of 3:50 PM CST, November 20 2025.

There are 1,478,366 known asteroids and 4,043 comets as of November 20, 2025, per NASA/JPL Solar Dynamics Website.

6,052 planets beyond our solar system have now been confirmed as of November 20, 2025 per NASA’s Exoplanet Archive.

Full Moon occurs at 5:15 PM CST or 23:15 UTC on December 4 when the Moon, being on the opposite side of the Earth as the Sun will be fully illuminated. This full moon was known by early Native American tribes as the Full Cold Moon because this is the time of year when the cold winter air settles in and the nights become long and dark. This moon has also been known as the Moon Before Yule and the Full Long Nights Moon.

This is also the last of three supermoons for 2025. The Moon will be near its closest approach to the Earth and may look slightly larger and brighter than usual.

During a Full Moon the Moon’s magnitude is -12.7. The Moon will be at Perigee or its closest approach to Earth on December 4, when she will be 221,806 miles from Earth.

Last Quarter Moon, or when the moon has only the Eastern side illuminated, will occur December 11 at 2:52 PM CST or 20:52 UTC.

During a Quarter Moon the Moon’s magnitude is -10.0.

The Geminid Meteor Shower peaks on December 13-14. Geminids are one of the year’s best meteor showers. It is my favorite meteor shower and considered by many to be the best shower in the heavens. It’s a consistent and prolific shower, and usually the most satisfying of all the annual showers, even surpassing the more widely recognized Perseids of August. This shower typically produces 50 or more multicolored meteors an hour, or about one every minute, and at the peak 120 meteors per hour.

The dazzling Geminid meteor shower starts around mid-evening and increases in intensity as evening deepens into late night. No matter where you live worldwide, the greatest number of meteors usually fall in the wee hours after midnight, or for a few hours centered around 2 a.m. local time, as the Earth plows headlong into the stream. If you’re game, you can watch the Geminid shower all the way from mid-evening until dawn.

The Geminids are produced by debris left behind by an asteroid known as 3200 Phaethon, which was discovered in 1982. The shower runs annually from December 7-17. It peaks this year on the night of the 13th and morning of the 14th. The morning of the 15th could also be nearly as active this year.

The Last quarter moon will block some of the fainter meteors this year, but the Geminids are so numerous that it should still be a good show. Best viewing will be from a dark location after midnight. Meteors will radiate from the constellation Gemini, but can appear anywhere in the sky.

The Moon will be at Apogee or its farthest distance from Earth on December 17, when she will be 252,478 miles from Earth.

New Moon occurs December 19 at 7:44 PM CST or 1:44 UTC December 20. The Moon will on the same side of the Earth as the Sun and will not be visible in the night sky. This is the best time of the month to observe faint objects such as galaxies and star clusters because there is no moonlight to interfere.

Winter Solstice occurs at 9:02 AM or 15:02 UTC December 21. The South Pole of the earth will be tilted toward the Sun, which will have reached its southernmost position in the sky and will be directly over the Tropic of Capricorn at 23.44 degrees south latitude. This is the first day of winter (winter solstice) in the Northern Hemisphere and the first day of summer (summer solstice) in the Southern Hemisphere.

The Ursid meteor shower, a minor meteor shower, which runs annually from December 17-25 will peak on the night and morning of December 21 – 22 producing about 5-10 meteors per hour. It is produced by dust grains left behind by comet Tuttle, which was first discovered in 1790.

The thin, crescent moon will set early in the evening, leaving dark skies for what should be a good show. Best viewing will be just after midnight from a dark location far away from city lights. Meteors will radiate from the constellation Ursa Minor, or The Little Dipper, but can appear anywhere in the sky.

First Quarter Moon, or when the moon has only the Western side illuminated, will occur December 27 at 1:10 PM CST or 19:10 UTC.

During a Quarter Moon the Moon’s magnitude is -10.0.

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Christmas

Christmas is my favorite time of the year.

Christmastime is a time of wonder & mystery. A time of bright lights, shining trees and the time of hide and seek, as presents are hidden from inquiring minds and fingers.

It is a time when one’s mind and memories drift back to days of childhood, and Christmases now long gone by. Remembering friends and family, some here, some now gone & longing that they were near once again, as it was once upon a time not so long ago.
And it is a time when, if we allow ourselves and don’t choose to “Grinch out” and be sour pusses, we can become kids once again.

Most importantly though, it’s a time to remember that the true “reason for the season” occurred in a manger, long ago on that first cold and chilly “Silent Night.”

So, as you go about your Christmas preparations remember the magic that was there when you were a child & don’t let that magic die. Make it magic once again

For Christmas truly is “the most wonderful time of the year”.

From the House of Mark WD4NYL and Teresa KQ4JC, we wish you all a very safe and Merry Christmas!

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This month’s meeting will feature the ALERT Christmas Party on December 9 at 7:00 PM at the National Weather Service Forecast office at the Shelby County Airport.

Mark / WD4NYL
Editor
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