Over the weekend of 18 and 19 June 2016, the ACO (Air Cadet Organisation) will be organising and running a military style national radio exercise named ‘Exercise Blue Ham’, this will be one of the many events the organisation is holding to mark its 75th Anniversary of Formation during 2016-17.

To make this successful, the ACO have requested as many Amateur Radio Operators to take part to make the exercise the biggest radio exercise that the organisation has been involved in.

The exercise will take place on the MOD 5MHz (60 Meters) Band and a significant part of the exercise will be on the section of the band that amateurs are authorised to use.

The Cadet stations will operate from noon 17 June until noon 18 June on specific frequencies within the band. These frequencies will be published live on the internet as the exercise is in progress and amateurs are welcome to check the exercise web site and call in on the advertised frequencies. The website will be continually updated with test software data along with frequency changes etc. Contact information will also be displayed.

Anniversary Certificates will be issued for amateur stations that contact 50 or 75 Cadet stations during the exercise.

This exercise does not give amateur stations permission to operate outside of their normal licensing conditions.

The ACO looks forward to operating as many of you that we can during the period of the Exercise and it will give our young operators an ideal opportunity for them to utilise their radio operating training on HF equipment to a different audience.

Exercise Blue Ham - http://www.alphacharlie.org.uk/blueham