{"id":44354,"date":"2025-12-18T16:57:14","date_gmt":"2025-12-18T16:57:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/rsgb.org\/main\/?p=44354"},"modified":"2026-01-21T11:40:50","modified_gmt":"2026-01-21T11:40:50","slug":"dr-bob-whelan-g3pjt-4-december-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rsgb.org\/main\/blog\/news\/silent-keys\/2025\/12\/18\/dr-bob-whelan-g3pjt-4-december-2025\/","title":{"rendered":"Dr Bob Whelan, G3PJT – 4 December 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"

It is with great sadness that we have to report the death of Dr Bob Whelan, G3PJT on 4th December 2025.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Bob\u2019s contribution to amateur radio in the UK and beyond was enormous. He played a highly significant role in RSGB, firstly as a member of the HF and Management Committees and then for two periods as Board Member and President of the Society. He also served on the Interim Board of RSGB during a period of turbulence in the Society\u2019s affairs, making a significant contribution to the creation of better governance arrangements.<\/p>\n

Bob\u2019s past roles included President of FOC, the First Class CW Operators Club (and an Honorary Member of the Club), and a Board member of the Radio Communications Foundation in the UK. Bob also represented IARU in CEPT on radio spectrum regulation as the Chairman of the IARU Region 1 Radio Regulatory Working Group. He co-authored the DX Code of Conduct, setting out best operating practice on the amateur bands.<\/p>\n

First licensed in 1961, Bob\u2019s main interest was in HF\/LF CW operation. In this he soon became a strong supporter and promoter of the Commonwealth Contest, operating from a number of DX locations over the years and winning the Junior Rose Bowl from Grenada.\u00a0 He authored the book \u201cReflections in a Rosebowl\u201d which covers the history of the Commonwealth Contest and he put much effort into building an on-line Commonwealth Contest community. Bob also operated for a time with the Voodoo contest group, a successful group which operated from West Africa in CQWW Contests.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Bob\u2019s practical interests in amateur radio extended beyond operating to construction of impressive pieces of equipment, covering SDR and DSP transceivers, linear amplifiers and phased antennas, including building test equipment for optimising phased arrays. He was always a source of authoritative and helpful advice on many aspects of radio technology and over a decade ago created a remote facility for accessing his home station, which could be used at local radio clubs. He was an active member of Camb Hams and operated in contests for them.<\/p>\n

Professionally, Bob was a solid-state physicist and served for nine years as Director of the Centre for Exploitation of Science and Technology, an independent think-tank funded by government and industry. Most recently he was a Council Member of the Smith Institute for Applied Mathematics and System Engineering. Bob was focused on advocating ways of capitalising on technology innovation in the UK for economic growth.<\/p>\n

Bob was the strongest of advocates for amateur radio and was always ready to offer thoughtful and authoritative advice in a quiet and constructive way. His sense of humour combined with a generous, encouraging style meant many benefitted from his skill and knowledge.\u00a0 Above all, he was a gentleman, and a friend to many.<\/p>\n

Amateur radio has lost one of its giants.<\/p>\n

We send our condolences to his wife Rosemary and the family at this sad time.<\/p>\n

Don Beattie, G3BJ<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It is with great sadness that we have to report the death of Dr Bob Whelan, G3PJT on 4th December 2025. Bob\u2019s contribution to amateur radio in the UK and beyond was enormous. He played a highly significant role in RSGB, firstly as a member of the HF and Management Committees and then for two […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20377,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[266],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-44354","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-silent-keys"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rsgb.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44354","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rsgb.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rsgb.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rsgb.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/20377"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rsgb.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44354"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/rsgb.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44354\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":44753,"href":"https:\/\/rsgb.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44354\/revisions\/44753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rsgb.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44354"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rsgb.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44354"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rsgb.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44354"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}