Among my Radio Scouting activities has been serving as team leaders  for amateur radio operation at several Scout Jamborees.

The 2013 USA National Jamboree was the first Jamboree at the Boy Scouts’ new property at The Summit in West Virginia. So, many things changed from the earlier Jamborees at Fort A.P. Hill.

A key aspect for amateur radio was that Icom America installed three repeaters on a permanent basis for all events at the Summit as well as supporting the local community. Thank you, Icom!

You can learn more about the K2BSA 2013 Jamboree operation at the K2BSA website. Highlights of the Jamboree were providing amateur radio demonstrations for over 2,600 Scouts with 340 earning the Radio Merit Badge. We also conducted an amateur radio direction finding course, launched four high-altitude balloons, and had an inspiring contact with the International Space Station. It was a great Jamboree.

They also invited me back for the 2017 Jamboree. We achieved similar results with 2,457 Scouts going through our demonstration station and 305 earning the Radio Merit Badge. No ISS contact this time due to a conflict with the astronauts’ work schedule but we did work a number of LEO satellites, launch a couple of balloons, and run an ARDF-Foxhunting course. You can see the full results at 2017 Jamboree Report.

The NA1WJ amateur radio operation at the 2019 World Scout Jamboree at the Summit Bechtel Scout Reserve in West Virginia was a success. Great numbers and incredible accomplishments by a superb team of amateur radio operators from Australia, Canada, Chile, Finland, Germany, Japan, Liechtenstein, Malaysia, Netherlands, Norway, Switzerland, Taiwan, United Kingdom, USA, and Zimbabwe. You can find the numbers, after action report, and links to ISS and Balloon Launch videos, etc. at NA1WJ 2019 Final Report.

Here’s the QSL cards for the 2013 National Scout Jamboree and for the 2019 World Scout Jamboree operations.