First Road Trip in the New KF4LMT Mobile - Overnight Road Trip in Northeast Florida; 17/18 August 2025

On Sunday and Monday, I took my first road trip in the new KF4LMT Mobile, visiting Northeast Florida. The new mobile station is quite a departure from what I've used before so I was very interested in how it would work and what I would be able to hear with it. I visited the USS Orleck (DD-886) Naval Museum in downtown Jacksonville, the Camp Blanding Museum in Starke, FL, and Olustee Battlefield Historic State Park in the Osceola National Forest on Sunday, overnighted in Kingsland, GA, and returned to Savannah on Monday morning. Sunday morning's weather forecast called for an almost 100% chance of rain and thunderstorms in the Jacksonville area, but although it was hot, humid, and oppressive all day it never rained or stormed (at least where I was at). I've visited the Orleck before, but this was my first visit to the Camp Blanding Museum and the Olustee Battlefield, which gave me the opportunity to listen in Bradford and Union Counties for the first time. It was also the first time I've been west of Jacksonville in quite a while, so it was good to see what I could hear out that way. 

USS Orleck (DD-886) in downtown Jacksonville on the St Johns River

Coastal Georgia Military Monitoring Recap; July 2025

July was an eventful and productive month radio-wise. It seems that Summer often brings a lull in good monitoring, but the past month definitely didn't fit that pattern. Locally, July saw a callsign change at Hunter AAF with one of the 3rd Combat Aviation Brigade units and activity from the Florida ANG F-35As from Jacksonville continued to increase as they receive their new jets. I caught some interesting visitors during the month, the most interesting was a UK Royal Air Force RC-135W, SHINR 40,as it flew across the States, presumably en route back to the UK. I also caught an An-124 on it's inbound and outbound trips as it delivered some kind of cargo to Florida's Space Coast. I recently added a Stridsberg Engineering MCA204M multicoupler to the shack at home and it has significantly improved my ability to receive activity from the A-10s from Moody AFB operating in the Moody MOAs (thus the increased amount of Moody activity noted below). The penultimate day of the month brought a wonderful surprise; Valiant Air Command's warbird C-47, "Tico Belle" was in Savannah dropping paratroopers at Hunter Army Airfield. I've had the opportunity to visit her several times at their museum in Titusville, but this was the first time I'd seen her in flight. 

After 13 years, I had to replace KF4LMT Mobile at the end of July; the way the new mobile station is going to be set up will be a significant departure from the last two KF4LMT Mobiles, so I'll have a blog post about that in the future. 

Valiant Air Command's C-47, "Tico Belle" flying over Savannah while dropping paratroopers at Hunter Army Airfield on Wednesday, 30 July 2025

Coastal Georgia Military Monitoring Recap; June 2025

June provided more radio time than May did and this month's recap reflects it. It also contains more Charleston area information than usual due to a week-long Charleston road trip. The month was notable for a visiting unit at the Savannah Combat Readiness Training Center/Air Dominance Center, an aircraft carrier off the SC/GA/FL coast, and more changes at MCAS Beaufort. I also heard an Azerbaijani military/government aircraft for the first time, as one was flying out of Savannah-Hilton Head IAP, no doubt at the Gulfstream Service Center there. 

NAVY HV 555 (MH-60R, 166592, HSM-50) doing hover work at Jekyll Island Airport on 18 June 2025

Changes to the Mobile Communications America DMR System at Georgia Ports Authority Savannah

Some time back, I noticed that the Mobile Communications of America 800 MHz DMR trunked repeater system (TRS) at Georgia Ports Authority in Savannah had changed configuration; no longer was anything being heard with it programmed into my gear as as Connect Plus system, but the SDS100 was seeing it as a Tier III system. I didn't have the time to pursue it any further at the time and added it to my radio "to-do" list. Over the weekend, I stayed up all night watching the 24 Hours of Le Mans sports car race and decided to check the MCA DMR system at Georgia Ports off the list; letting the SDS100's LCN finder run on it while I worked on the Charleston Road Trip Report and watched the race.

Military History, Colonial History, African American and Gullah Geechee History, Civil War History, and BBQ in the "Holy City" - Charleston, SC Road Trip Report; 9-13 June 2025

For several years now, I've wanted to visit the International African American Museum in Charleston, SC, so for this year's Summer vacation I took a week-long road trip to Charleston. I didn't really plan it, but it turned out that a good bit of the History I took in on this trip centered on the African American and Gullah Geechee experience in the Lowcountry. In addition to the International African American Museum, I visited Patriot's Point (taking day and night tours), Charles Towne Landing, the South Carolina Aquarium, the Old Slave Mart Museum, the Old Exchange and Provost Dungeon, McLeod Plantation, the North Charleston Fire Museum, Fort Johnson, and Fort Lamar. I also tried three of Charleston's BBQ restaurants; at one of them I had the best BBQ I've ever eaten. During the road trip, I was able to listen to the area's military and aviation communications, federal and USCG communications, public safety communications, and more. I did very little on amateur radio during this trip; I had just a couple of QSOs on the 146.7900- (PL 123.0) repeater on the USS Yorktown at Patriot's Point and checked into the "Scanner Junkies" net on TGIF DMR using DroidStar on Thursday night.

An F-4J Phantom II, Charleston Harbor, and the Ravenel Bridge as seen from the Bridge of the USS Yorktown (CV-10) at Patriots Point in Charleston, SC

Coastal Georgia Military Monitoring Recap; May 2025

May was a busy month with not a lot of radio time, but there were some interesting things to listen to during the radio time I did have. The Blue Angels, Golden Knights, F-22 Demo Team, and civilian performers were in Brunswick for the Golden Isles Airshow and the USS Iwo Jima (LHD-7) ARG and 22nd MEU were in the area for training. The military performers only flew on Saturday; unfortunately, thunderstorms moved in on Sunday afternoon and forced the cancellation of the second half of the days' show. Several foreign air force/government Gulfstreams were at the Gulfstream Savannah Service Center and several aircraft from other countries transited through Coastal Georgia. The Goodyear Blimp even transited through Savannah airspace one afternoon.

Blue Angel 6 performing at the Golden Isles Airshow in Brunswick

Coastal Georgia Military Monitoring Recap; April 2025

April was a really, really weird month for me. Some family medical issues and car problems during a Charleston road trip led to multiple trips back and forth between Charleston and Savannah and the loss of KF4LMT Mobile for two weeks while it was being repaired. The end result was less radio time than usual but the radio time I did have yielded a lot of activity due to how much was going on in the area this month. There were visits to the Savannah Combat Readiness Training Center/Air Dominance Center from multiple ANG units, helicopters from 3rd AVN at Hunter AAF were in the field at Fort Stewart, the Golden Knights did some jumps at Savannah Bananas games, and I was able to hear some Cape Canaveral SFS rocket launch radio traffic from Savannah. I'm glad there were plenty of interesting things to listen to during April, but I'll be glad if May is a more normal month in other respects. 

In the shack on Monday, 28 April 2025, monitoring the ULA Atlas V/Amazon Kuiper 1 launch from Cape Canaveral SFS; I was surprised I could hear some HF activity with the HF+ Discovery and YouLoop antenna hanging on the closet door.