For many years, WAP did try to understand the exact place where Delfin M. Val (EA4BOD) was active from, during the Scientific Spanish Expedition called “Antartida 9101 IEO”. Nobody so far has been able to confirm where, in which part of the South Orkney he was operating from!
For sure, Delfin, who did sign EDØBOD in January 1991 did operate from Laurie Island in the South Orkneys as generically reported on his QSL, but our question was: Where exactly?
I met EA4BOD (now SK) in Torremolinos Spain in 1994; I was so excited to be close to a famous person who had aroused my admiration from the very first moment, that it didn’t even cross my mind to ask him for more details of his Antarctic journey when he worked there with a scientific research team.!
Delfin EA4BOD, had an interesting life; in 1937 he was taken from an orphanage to the Soviet Union where he went to school, grew up, got married, had children, and stayed till 1975 when he returned to Spain. Being a skilled technician Delfin has written several publications on the field of HF radio transmission and on the theory of antennas and their practical construction. See: https://www.urvag.com/phocadownloadpap/EA4BOD_Calculo_instalacion_antenas.pdf
Well, Laurie Island is the site of the Argentinean Base “Orcadas” (WAP ARG-15) which coordinates reported on the card are 60° 45’South, 44° 43’ West; this is a permanent Scientific Base on Laurie Island; maybe EDØBOD could have operate from there but one of the QSLs found recently (see below) reports different coordinates: 60°45’South, 44° 40’ West
Different coordinates, 44°45’West (Base Naval Orcadas-Argentina), versus 44°40’West, reported on EDØBOD mean different locations!
Luckily, we have a great friend, a real expert of these island; I’m talking about a famous character, Prof. Lyubomir Ivanov who I reached when he was in Antarctica involved in a research mission.
Question put to Prof. Ivanov:
We did work several stations in Antarctica; two of them taken as example, did operate from Laurie Island: One is LU1ZA Base Orcadas, the other one is a Spanish operation dated 1991; EDØBOD reported to be at 60° 45’ South, 44°40’West.
As cartographer, You are an expert of Laurie island and perhaps you could have better information about the exact location where the Spanish expedition did operate from. Hope you can find what I haven’t been able to find so far…!
Prof. Ivanov replyed: We are restricted to dealing with just degrees and minutes, no seconds. Then the coordinates of Argentinean Orcadas Base would be 60°44’S, 44°44’W. As for the reported EDØBOD point coordinates 60°45’South, 44°40’West, the nearest named geographic feature would be Point Moreno at 60°45’S 44°41’W. So, my guess is that the Spanish QSL card refers to Point Moreno if not erroneously referring to some other nearby location or Orcadas Base itself.
Best, Lyubo
If Delfin had been at the Argentine Orcadas base he would have been used EA4BOD/LU or LU/ED4DOD or LU/EDØBOD, but it wasn’t like that! So, at the light of the above information, WAP confirms what we have stated 34 years ago; EDØBOD is Orcadas Camp Base, WAP ESP-Ø3, unless other more precise information eventually coming!