Biography

THE FIRST SPECIAL CALL SIGN IN POLAND CREATED TO THE SPFF FIELD OPERATIONS, ORGANIZES AN EXPEDITONS - SINCE MAY 2009 - UNDER WORLD FLORA FAUNA and SPFF PROGRAMM FOR WORKS FROM NATIONAL PARKS

JUNE 4, 2016 SN0WFF AS THE FIRST POLISH STATION BEGAN PARTICIPATING IN THE PROGRAM W.H.S.A. SN0WFF WORKED WITH THE UNESCO - PROTECTED AREA WH-PL008

AUGUST 16, 2016 LY/SN0WFF AS THE FIRST STATION FROM LITHUANIA BEGAN PARTICIPATING IN THE PROGRAM W.H.S.A.

LY/SN0WFF WORKED WITH THE UNESCO - PROTECTED AREA WH-LT007



SN0WFF station has been working with the club SP5ZIM for many years.

However, our partnership came to an end in 2015 due to breach of SPFF regulations by members of the SP5ZIM club who also showed a disregard to the ruls of HAM SPIRIT.



The history of SN0WFF

It all started in spring 2009. Seated in front of the computer I had been skimming through Russian ham’s sites and came across the World Flora and Fauna WFF dedicated site, which was established on 1 July 2008 by Russian Robinson Club RRC, with Valerij RW3GW as a chairman. WFF was an international program, who’s main purpose were to rise an awareness to the importance of protecting nature, flora and fauna, to show support for areas which required protection, as well as to encourage ham radio community to operate their stations from designated parks and nature reserves. At that time only national parks and nature reserves were part of the program.
First week of July 2008 was the Activity week from all protected areas. Next activity of that sort was planned in July 2009, so I thought it would be great to create a special callsign to show my support to that cause. However, in those times it wasn’t that simple, as individuals were not allowed to apply for the callsigns. To proceed further with my idea, I contacted my friend Andrzej SP5X and after long discussions we came to the agreement that our club should come forward and request a callsign for us. I was a member of the club since 1988, my friend even longer. At that time club’s callsign SP5ZIM was not exactly active, club members would gather together from time to time for a casual chat and a cup of tea.
We got in touch with our chairman and presented him with our idea, he was very pleased especially because our callsign was not active for a long time and granted us our request.
Our next step was to create our special callsign. According to the program it had to contain WFF in it. After hours of thinking, together with my colleague Pawel RU5A we went through many names like SP0, HF0, 3Z0, but our final decision fell on SN0WFF. Our boss didn’t have anything against it, so in a short while the name was approved by UKE.
Meantime, Andrzej and I were busy organizing our first activity from a national park, for a Green Day, beginning of July 2009. It was agreed that it’s going to be Biebrzanski National Park.
So many things needed to be taken care of. Andrzej was responsible for contacting park’s authorities and securing our new QSL’s. My job was to prepare necessary equipment (cables, antennas, radios). Some had to be borrowed as I hadn’t own appropriate stuff suitable for that kind of activity. Our adventures from that expedition are described at http://www.qrz.ru/callbook?from=call&yt0=%D0%9D%D0%B0%D0%B9%D1%82%D0%B8&q=sn0wff.
The start of WFF program was slow but gradually it grew stronger and bigger with more countries joining in. In SP other special callsign stations appeared which were showing interest in WFF program. Andrzej and I had decided to visit all Polish national parks. We mainly planned a few day trips and our main goal was to make as many QSO as possible. I felt very proud that thousands of hams could make their QSO with SN0WFF.
In similar manner passed the year 2010, and some years after. Generally, I organized up to 3-4 expeditions during one calendar year. We were joined by one more club member Andrzej SP5UUD.
Because of other commitments, we couldn’t go for few day expeditions very often, however, the trips we did manage to go to were compensated by making a record number of QSO (up to few thousands for each expedition). Over the years we work hard to earn a good name and respect from members of other clubs. Each expedition was considered as an opportunity to build even better relationships between club members.
In year 2012, WFF fell apart. An international team took over the program, followed by the new name World Wide Flora and Fauna- WWFF, as well as new regulations and new protection areas were added alongside national parks and conservation areas, so the list of places came up to almost a thousand. National Award Program was introduced for Hunters and Activators, which started to put more accent on number of activations made.
At the beginning of 2014 we were joined by one more club member Ryszard SP5KD. At the end of the same year I started to notice abnormal activity of SN0WFF. Up until then we only made 3-4 expeditions during the year, now it showed few in a month, even during the week. Nobody even notified me that any expedition was organized, so I grew suspicious and started to analyse activity logs which definitely were abnormal. It appeared that some of my colleagues had totally lost ham’s spirit and as a result started to break ham’s code, trying to misappropriate SN0WFF.
In year 2015, on my request, the chairman of SP5ZIM gave me the SN0WFF, so from April that year it officially started to be my second sign, which before could not be handed to me because of existing regulations.
Despite all problems, I had not stopped working on the program which I started in 2009.
Analysing all past events, I came to the conclusion, that even same minded people not always hold the same values and share your vision, so it’s better to pursue your own mission.

Worked DXCCs: