San Antonio Hams

While some of us have operated in the field under emergency conditions such as during hurricanes and just after earthquakes, most hams haven’t.

I have done both, but during the recent series of Haitian earthquakes I have been, for the most part, on the “sidelines”.

I currently monitor some of the emcomm traffic coming out of the affected area by listening to the SATERN frequencies and even taking a turn at being a SATERN net control op.

Very few communications have been coming out of the country because there are presently only two amateur radio operators down there.

Hopefully, things will change if agencies get “their act together” and send communications “Jump Teams” to help send health and welfare traffic from Haiti so loved ones back in the U.S. and other countries will know that their friends/relatives in Haiti are alive. Just this simple act will relieve a lot of burden and suffering.

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Title: Skywarn Training
Location: UT Pickle Research Campus – North Austin
Link out: Click here
Description: 20th Annual Lou Withrow SKYWARN
Austin / South Central Texas Severe Weather Spotter Training Session

February 20th, 2010

Schedule, Presentations and other information can be found at http://www.utexas.edu/depts/grg/kimmel/skywarn2010.html
Start Time: 08:15
Date: 2010-02-20

Title: Heart of the Hills Endurance Ride
Location: Hill Country State Natural Area – Bandera Texas
Link out: Click here
Description: An AERC – American Endurance Ride Conference sanctioned event. Proceeds from the event Benefit the Muscular Dystrophy Association

Needed: 5 – 6 Amateur Radio Operators to monitor and pass safety information as required by the race management. Expected communications to be simplex – minimum requirement 25 + watts VHF – self contained. Most locations are vehicle accessible. This is a one day event, starting at 0700 Saturday – March 6th. Interested operators should contact Louis Upton at k1stx@yahoo.com for more information. Also, a briefing from the event manager will be held at the Hill Country REACT meeting – Wednesday – January 27th at 1900 hrs.
Extra: packet and uhf repeater testing may occur during the event.
Start Time: 07.00
Date: 2010-03-06

BEXAR OPERATORS GROUP announces the 2010 version of it’s “Jump Team Boot Camp” which will be held on May 14 – 16th. This year’s event is a full three days. 

This would be the fourth “Jump Team Boot Camp” given by the Bexar Operators Group. It would be a three day deployment event at a site yet to be disclosed. This “Jump Team Boot Camp” will concentrate on amateur radio and the ways and means to get a communications jump team operational should there be a need to deploy some distance from your home and communicate in the aftermath of a disaster when nothing is left standing. Learn what other groups don’t teach. This is a complete “hands on” class.

Just like previous sessions given by the Bexar Operators Group, this will be an actual drive-and-operate operation and NOT a desktop drill. When the destination has been reached, all participants will assist in the construction of shelters and operating areas after being prepped on procedures.

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On board was a crew of seven: Colonel Rick Husband; Lt. Colonel Michael Anderson; Commander Laurel Clark; Captain David Brown; Commander William McCool; Dr. Kalpana Chawla; & Ilan Ramon, a Colonel in the Israeli Air Force.

The Nacogdoches Amateur Radio Club will again hold a special event station in remembrance of the shuttle disaster on Feb. 1, 2003.

The event will occur on Saturday, Feb. 6, 2010. Ham operators from other areas are welcome to attend the event. If you cannot come to Nacogdoches, we would like to hear from you on 20 or 40 meters. Operation will begin at 0800 CST (1400 UTC) and end at 1500 CST (2100 UTC).

The station will be set up at the McMichael Middle School located at 4330 SE Stallings Drive in Nacogdoches. This is on Loop 224 between Hwy 21 east and FM 2259. The event commemorates how the ham radio operators from the local area went into action immediately after the shuttle crash to provide emergency communications and relay traffic necessary to the coordination of the event. Within hours, ham operators from across the state of Texas and other states as well also became involved. Many ham radio clubs sent members to assist in providing communications for the varied search teams. Other clubs provided towers and repeater equipment necessary to relay vital information.

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Reprinted from the CQ / WorldRadio Online Newsroom:

Some ham radio activity from Haiti is beginning to be heard, following yesterday’s devastating earthquake.

Father John Henault, HH6JH, in Port-au-Prince, made contact late Wednesday morning with the Intercontinental Assistance and Traffic Net (IATN) on 14.300 MHz, the IARU Global Centre of Activity frequency for emergency communications. Based on relays monitored at W2VU, Father John reported that he and those with him were safe, but had no power and no phone service. He was operating on battery power and hoping to get a generator running later in the day. He asked the station copying him, William Sturridge, KI4MMZ, in Flagler Beach, Florida, to telephone relatives with information that he was OK.

The following frequencies are in use for earthquake-related traffic and should be kept clear unless you are able to provide requested assistance:

• 14300 (IATN),
• 14265 (SATERN);
• 7045 (IARU Region II) and
• 3720 (IARU Region II) kHz.

Additional frequencies may be activated on different bands at different times of day, so be sure to listen carefully before transmitting to make sure you are not interfering with emergency traffic.

W2IK now has a new EMCOMM only web site:  WWW.W2IK.NET   which contains emcomm info including parts of his 250 page “EMCOMM AND YOU” CD.    

This site is a work in progress and is constantly growing, but it’s presently  loaded with lots of useful information about developing your own emergency communications skills.   

 This site contains ONLY EMCOMM material.

The new Canadian training course contains over 100 pages which were written by W2IK, so we must be doing something right.

This old style black & white movie about “Radio Hams” was done in the style of a news broadcast from Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios, a Pete Smith Specialty production.  Language is in English, even though the original poster wrote the submission in another language.  Movie is about 9:58 minutes long.  Has an interesting ending…

This is the model of the balloon we will be flying

On February 26th (2200Z) until February 28th (2200Z) The Bexar Operators Group, W5BOG, will be operating from the Choke Canyon State Park, located in Calliham just west of Three Rivers, Texas, in the sheltered (cabin) area.

We will be testing a balloon launched vertical antenna about 126 feet high. It will be stabilized by four guy-cords. A special based-loaded antenna balun (4:1) has been obtained for easier antenna matching. The ground radial system will have at least 4 full sized wires with possibly more.

We will also make a determination, based upon weather conditions and the number of people assisting, to use this vertical just for transmit and use a “beverage antenna” for receive and/or increase the vertical antenna height to 252 feet so we can better compete during this “top band” event.

Two, 9 foot meteorological balloons have been purchased for this experiment, just in case we screw up with the first “flight”.    Helium tanks will be purchased close to the flight-date.    Pictures of the step-by-step antenna setup and station operation will be taken for article submission in either “QST” or “CQ” magazine.  

Checking my mail box yesterday, I was quite surprised to find an envelope from the “Heartland DX Association”.

This club runs the Nebraska QSO Party, which is held in late April each year.

See: http://www.hdxa.net/  

I had competed in this contest in 2007 and was given a certificate for top score from Texas. In 2008, I again competed but never received a reply nor were any results posted. Since I never knew what really happened, I didn’t compete in the 2009 event.

You can imagine my shock when I just received a certificate for “Tops From Texas” for the 2008 contest!   In 2010 I will compete in other state QSO events and hopefully will get rewarded with more certificates, but in a more timely manner.     You should try a few of these contests as well as they are alot of fun!

Also see: http://sanantoniohams.org/blog/?p=821

  73 Bob W2IK