During our last holidays, we visited the “Amrumbank” lightship in Emden, northern Germany. The ship, which was once a lightship near the Amrumbank, now serves as a museum ship and lies in Emden harbour.

It is still seaworthy and continues to go to sea several times a year, albeit for tourist purposes. At the beginning of my visit, I noticed a few wires on the mast of the ship that looked like antennas to me.

Later, my suspicions were confirmed when I discovered a radio shack through a window on the upper deck. The call sign “DF0MF” of the club station was also written on the door to the shack.

The responsible person for this station was identified on site and contacted by email. My wish to be able to operate on a ship was soon to be fulfilled: The responsible OM Helmut DJ6ZJ made an appointment with me while I was still on holiday to let me use the shack.

On the following Monday, the time had come and I was able to put the DF0MF station into operation. Although the conditions were poor, it was a lot of fun operating from a ship. In the end I was able to log 20 QSOs from which one was with Alex, GM5ALX on 40m.

I would like to thank Helmut, DJ6ZJ, for the opportunity to operate from this historic lightship!