A Störsender satire by Hansl Hohlleiter
It was a perfectly normal Saturday afternoon on 40 metres. The sun was shining, the bands were open, and Markus, OE0MGL, was calling CQ. Clean SSB on 7.130. A textbook CQ — callsign, frequency, short and sweet. Markus wasn’t a beginner: Class 1 licence, eight years on the air, locator JN77DS. He’d just put a steak on the barbecue when the speaker crackled to life.
“This is OE0KGN, Oscar Echo Zero Kilo Golf November, back to the calling station.”
Karl Grantner, OE0KGN. Markus didn’t recognise the callsign, but the voice sounded like a man who’d been on shortwave since the valves still glowed inside the transceiver. Deep, slightly raspy. A voice that radiated authority — or at least the feeling that it ought to.
It started harmlessly enough. Name, QTH, signal report. Karl was near Linz, had a dipole in the garden, and was a solid 5-7. Markus gave him 5-8 back, thanked him for the call. Nice QSO, Markus thought, and flipped the steak.
Then Karl asked: “Tell me, what’s your antenna orientation?“
“East-west,” said Markus. “It’s a dipole, hung between two trees.”
Karl grunted with satisfaction. That was an answer he understood. East-west. Two trees. A dipole. Proper stuff.
“And where exactly are you?” Karl continued.
“My locator is Juliet November Seven Seven Delta Sierra,” said Markus, because that’s what you do when someone asks for your location. You give the Maidenhead locator. People have been doing this since 1980. For over forty years. It’s not a secret code, not rocket science, not quantum physics. It’s six characters that describe a location. Every radio amateur learns it during training.
Every radio amateur — except Karl.
What followed was a pause. Not the comfortable kind, where someone takes a moment to think. The kind where a man draws a deep breath before delivering a speech he’s been wanting to give for decades.
“Juliet November SEVEN SEVEN what?” came through the speaker, and Markus could hear Karl straightening up. “What’s that supposed to be? Can’t you just say where you live? Like a normal person?“
Markus tried to explain. “It’s the Maidenhead locator, Karl. It’s a standardised —”
But Karl had no intention of listening. Karl intended to transmit.
“Maidenhead!” Karl repeated, as though Markus had just used a swear word. “What sort of newfangled nonsense is this? Back in my day, you said: I’m in Linz. Or: I’m twenty kilometres south of Graz. Everyone understood that. EVERYONE. And now the young lot come along with their letters and numbers and codes, acting like amateur radio is some secret science!“
Markus didn’t press the PTT. There was no point.
Karl was in his element now. Karl was in monologue mode. And when Karl is in monologue mode, you can get up, make a coffee, finish grilling the steak, mow the lawn, and come back — Karl is still talking.
“I’ve been on the air for thirty-five years,” Karl continued — and that was probably true — “and I have NEVER needed any of this nonsense. When someone asks me where I am, I say: Linz. Upper Austria. Done. What do I need a locator for? Who came up with this? Probably some desk jockey at the IARU who’s never held a microphone in his life!“
Karl paused briefly for air — not because he was finished, but because even a man with thirty-five years of transmitting experience needs to breathe eventually.
“And then everyone wonders why nobody goes on shortwave anymore! Because you need a university degree before you’re allowed to have a QSO! Locator! Maidenhead! Grid square! What’s next — GPS coordinates to eighteen decimal places? Should I also give my blood type?“
Markus glanced at his watch. Karl had been transmitting for nearly two minutes. Non-stop. Without pause or punctuation. The steak was well done by now. The sun had disappeared behind a cloud. Somewhere on the frequency, someone else had surely been listening — and quietly turned the VFO.
“That’s the problem with young people today,” Karl concluded, and you could tell he believed he’d said something important. “Everything has to be complicated. Everything has to be modern. But amateur radio was always simple: key the mic, open your mouth, done. But no, these days you need apps and locators and computers and the internet. That’s not radio anymore, that’s — that’s — IT!” He spat the word out like a bad olive.
Markus waited three seconds to make sure Karl was actually finished. Then he pressed the PTT.
“Thanks for the QSO, Karl, and thanks for your opinion. I’m in Hartberg, by the way. Styria. And that locator I gave you — it’s been around since 1980. Anyway. 73 and have a nice weekend.”
Markus put the microphone down, took the steak off the grill, and shook his head. So many experts on the frequencies.
Karl, meanwhile, was satisfied. He’d shown the youngster. He’d said what needed to be said. He leaned back, took a sip of beer, and turned the VFO. Maybe he’d find another QSO partner. One who talks normally. One who just says where he lives.
One who agrees with him.
Hansl’s verdict: Karl Grantner has thirty-five years of experience in amateur radio. Thirty-five years during which he successfully avoided learning anything new. The Maidenhead locator is older than most of his grandchildren, but for Karl, everything he doesn’t know is “newfangled” — and he knows astonishingly little. The real irony? If he’d listened for two minutes instead of transmitting for two minutes, he might have learned something. But that’s the beauty of shortwave: the PTT button works even without content.
All persons and callsigns in this article are fictional. Resemblances to living radio amateurs are intentional but legally inconsequential. The author accepts no liability for spontaneous self-recognition.
Transparency Notice
This article was written with the assistance of AI (Claude, Anthropic). Editorial responsibility lies with the oeradio.at team. Feedback — including from Karl — welcome at [email protected].
