US Islands Awards Program

Individual map links added to each state/territory page

Published Nov 29, 2016 | By Ted Sarah

A link to the Google Earth file (.kmz) for the islands within each state and territory has been added to it’s page.  The color of the icon on the map indicates the status of the island, a pink icon indicates a Qualified island, and a yellow icon indicates an island that hasn’t been Qualified. And, as with all things, if you find a error let us know.
Look for this icon map-52 in front of the island count.

The Activation of Boyd Isl. TN025R ~ 27 April 2002

Published Apr 27, 2002 | By Susie Coleman

by Mike Gardner, WU4I

BOYD, oh BOYD, oh BOYD! How absolutely quiet! I mean, nothing stirring but some birds. I was looking at the boat ramp, and on over to Boyd island in the Holston river just east of Knoxville. Boyd island is a large plot of land, as far as east Tennessee goes, near the Forks of The Rivers, and the Holston, French Broad, and the Tennessee all meet there.

With only about one-hundred feet to traverse to the island, from the ramp, I decided to bring along the fast-becoming-famous “S.S.S. Minnowette”! I am sure some of you sea Captains are wondering what the heck “S.S.S.” is, so let me explain: “Surely Sinking Soon” Continue reading →

The Adventure to Goat Isl. AL029L

Published Oct 3, 2008 | By Susie Coleman

by KG4RWZ with K9TEN (Ottis and Craig)

In May of 2008, I was looking through the contest season calendars and noticed the US Islands contest in mid-October. Reading further, I realized that the only real way to compete with any dignity would be from a qualified island location. I started looking through the list of islands in North Alabama and Southern Middle Tennessee to find a suitable island to visit for the contest, but found only one island close by. That island is accessible via road and doesn’t appear to be much of an adventure to access. I also noticed that a very popular and well-known island, at least to the locals, is near a friend’s house on Smith Lake had not been qualified. So the quest began to find some friends to go play radio with me on the island.
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NS4J Marco Isl. FL025S January 2012

Published Jan 23, 2012 | By Jay Chamberlain

This activation of Marco Island, FL025S was not very successful in my eyes. I was plagued with equipments problems both days of operations. The first day the Yaesu was over run with static crashes on receive. I only managed 25 QSOs in a little over 2 hours, but I did snag Japan and Australia. The second day the Yaesu would only manage 20 watts out on all bands. With the NA QSO party in full swing it wasn’t worth my time yelling CQ so after 2 QSOs I packed it in and met my wife on the beach for a Pina Colada.
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Quarry Isl. OK028L ~ A CW Only Qualification by N5PHT

Published Oct 21, 2016 | By Jay Chamberlain

US Islands

The US Islands program (USI) is found at https://usislands.org/ and it is not associated with the IOTA program but rather for islands found within lakes, rivers and ocean shore of the United States. I also qualified one other USI, TX035L, Rattlesnake, many years ago and have activated TX003S, Goose island in the Gulf of Texas.
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