Jun 30
Bexar County Amateur Radio Emergency Service (ARES) held a massive Field Day training exercise at the San Antonio Fire Academy on June 27th and 28th. Teams from the Alamo Area Radio Organization (AARO), San Antonio Radio Club (SARC), Hill Country REACT (REACT), Radio Operators of South Texas (ROOST), and San Antonio Repeater Organization (SARO) were instrumental in bringing this activity together. The event was underwritten by each of these organizations, with generous sponsorship and participation from the San Antonio Fire Department (SAFD).
Club Banners on display just inside the entrance to San Antonio's Field Day event. Wade W5ERX making sure we didn't miss any while putting them up on Saturday AM.

Club Banners on display just inside the entrance to San Antonio's Field Day event. Wade W5ERX making sure we didn't miss any while putting them up on Saturday AM.

 
Field Day is an annual national event sponsored by the Amateur Radio Relay League (ARRL), designed to put the field capabilities of amateur radio operators to the test. Operating under the call sign K5EOC as a class 7A station (seven transmitters operating on generator/battery power), radio operators made hundreds of contacts using on HF and VHF using phone, PSK-31 and CW (aka “Morse code”). 
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Jun 30

Note: I normally only post Texas related articles here, but this group of hams got such great PR coverage in their paper that I had to post it here, with a link back to the original article of course.  I didn’t write this article, it is property of  THE SEATTLE TIMES Newspaper, the reporter (Kyung Song) and the photographer (Alan Berner) named in the article. – Lee N5NTG

Puget Sound ham-radio enthusiasts test their hobby’s emergency powers

In a world in which you can make a mobile call from Mount Everest and log onto the Internet from a polar-ice floe, you might expect ham radios to have long been consigned to the technological dustbin. But amateur radio endures, nourished by enthusiasts and sustained by its ability to transmit critical information even after the power supply goes out, cellphone towers get jammed and television and radio fall silent.

By Kyung M. Song
Seattle Times staff reporter

In a world where you can make a mobile call from Mount Everest and log on to the Internet from a polar-ice floe, you might expect ham radios to have long been consigned to the technological dustbin.

But amateur radio endures, nourished by enthusiasts and sustained by its ability to transmit critical information even after the power supply goes out, cellphone towers get jammed and television and radio fall silent.

Read the rest of this entry »

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