Radio awards are a staple of amateur radio: collect contacts, meet certain conditions, earn a certificate. If you don’t hold a ham licence, you’re usually left out. A new award programme from Carinthia, Austria, takes a different approach — explicitly welcoming CB radio and PMR-446 operators alongside licensed amateurs.
Six awards, zero barriers
The platform Kärnten Funkt recently launched six radio awards, all sharing one principle: amateur radio, CB and PMR-446 count equally. No licence, no exam, no minimum age required. PMR users simply register with their radio name — no callsign needed.
The awards at a glance
- Carinthian Lakes Award: Make radio contacts from or to Carinthian lakes. Three tiers: Bronze, Silver, Gold.
- Carinthian Districts Award: Reach all ten Carinthian districts by radio — as an activator on site or as a hunter from home.
- Three-Border Award: Cross-border contacts linking Austria, Italy and Slovenia.
- Carinthian Summit Award: Portable operation from Carinthian mountain peaks, similar to the SOTA programme — with tiers from Bronze to Platinum.
- Activity Award: Earn points at Kärnten Funkt events.
- Emergency Communications Award: Document and demonstrate personal emergency radio readiness.
Why this matters for licence-free operators
If you use a PMR handheld or CB radio, you know the problem: there are hardly any structured activities or goals. You get on the air, but there’s little incentive to head out or seek new contacts. These awards address exactly that gap.
The Lakes Award, for example, motivates you to hike to a Carinthian lake with your PMR radio and make a contact from there. The Summit Award combines outdoor radio with hiking — without the barrier of a ham licence. And the Three-Border Award turns the Carinthia–Friuli–Slovenia border region into a radio playground.
For families and beginners, this lowers the threshold considerably: a PMR radio costs from around 25 euros, is licence-free and ready to use straight away.
The summit and lake awards in particular turn the normally limited PMR range into a sporting challenge: in flat terrain, 500 mW typically reaches only one or two kilometres. But from a mountain summit — with a clear line of sight — PMR can suddenly cover 10, 20 or even 30 kilometres. The award motivates you to seek out exactly these situations: pick the right spot, place a second radio on the opposite slope or at the lake, and see if the contact succeeds. Radio as a small adventure.
Activators and hunters
The concept is familiar from SOTA and POTA: activators go out — to the lake, the summit, the district — and operate from there. Hunters work the activators from home or on the go. Both sides can collect points and earn awards. A mixed mode is also possible.
How to participate
Participation is straightforward: make contacts, log them and submit via the contact form on Kärnten Funkt or by email. There is no participation fee.
Perspective
Opening radio awards to licence-free services is unusual. In the amateur radio world, award programmes like SOTA, POTA or WWFF have been established for years — but they require a licence. The approach from Carinthia deliberately takes a different path, reaching an audience that previously had few structured activities.
Whether the concept spreads beyond Carinthia remains to be seen. The core idea — radio with purpose, without bureaucratic hurdles — certainly has potential.
73 – your oeradio.at editorial team
Transparency Notice
This article was researched and written with the assistance of AI (Claude, Anthropic). The editorial team has reviewed and edited all content. Despite careful review, occasional inaccuracies may occur — we welcome corrections via email to [email protected].
