Merry (belated) Christmas and HNY All! Jim, I hate to hear that! Fatigue near a base connection is a common failure I see on freestanding towers. Loose connections and bad welds tend to speed this process up from the ones I have analyzed. Moral of the story boys and girls: Tower maintenance requires eternal vigilance!!! Watch for any cracking or aberrations in the metal, welds or galvanizing!!! Also look for any strange movement in the tower under wind loads. Hope you have a speedy "recovery" Jim!! 73 David A. Norris, K5UZ Vice Director, Delta Div. -----Original Message----- From: James F. Boehner MD [mailto:jboehner01@yahoo.com] Sent: Sunday, December 26, 2010 3:33 PM To: arrl-odv Subject: Merry Christmas! Jim, sorry for your tower, shack and station-but great that you did not have any personal injury! Looks like the insurance company will have some work in front of them. On a better note, I found a very interesting Christmas Story by Gary KN4AQ: http://arvideonews.com/otherstuff/A_Ham's_Night_Before_Christmas.html I guess it has been around for a while, but this is the first time I have seen it! I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas/Holidays! Have a happy new year! '73 de JIM N2ZZ ARRL Vice Director Roanoke Division ARRL, the national association for Amateur RadioT From: K6JAT@aol.com [mailto:K6JAT@aol.com] Sent: Saturday, December 25, 2010 5:03 PM To: arrl-odv Cc: etg@tiemlaw.com; greentiem@comcast.net; k6jat@arrl.org Subject: [arrl-odv:19512] Merry Christmas! Greetings all and Merry Christmas! There I was checking my antenna system to decipher all the movement I saw during the current storm. It was not cranked down and the gusts were getting severe across the top of the ridge. Maybe the missing eucalyptus trees removed some wind protection, but then the entire tower came crashing down on my shack with me in it! One of the 3 legs snapped just above the base bolts and the 2 others bent right over. What a noise and am I lucky! I'm looking at what's left of the PRO-67B right outside my hf operating position, 5 feet away from me. Only the top most vertical hit the roof, but did not penetrate it. I'm still a little shaky. The US Tower freestanding tower had been up for almost 17 years. I hope all of you and your loved ones are well and having a wonderful holiday. Be safe! K6JAT is now off the air. Back to the drawing board. . . . 73, Jim K6JAT