San Antonio Hams

Title: 2014 AERC Heart of the Hills Endurance Event
Location: Hill Country State Natural Area – Chapa’s Camp – Bandera County, TX
Description: The AERC Heart of the HIlls is a 25 and 50 mile equestrian endurance event that test the horse and rider.

Hill Country REACT as well as members of other organizations has provided safety and tracking communications the last 4 years.

Amateur Radio has become and important part of this event due to the remoteness and terrain and lack of cell phone capability. Our familiarity with the facility provides us with an advantage over other options, We are able to consistently and accurately track the competitors at various checkpoints, we have become more than just a safety net!

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With the start of Summer, June 1st marked the beginning of “Hurricane Season”.

It’s been predicted to be a very active period (again). We hope a hurricane doesn’t strike our area, but we must be ready in case it does. Newly licensed hams have joined the amateur radio ranks just in time to become useful communicators should an emergency caused by severe weather arise. There is always a need for trained emergency communications personnel, but this is especially true in the areas which are more likely to be impacted by a hurricane, those regions being the Atlantic and Gulf Coast areas.

However, it takes more than just a license and a hand-held radio to make you a useful part of emergency communications. It also takes preparation, training and practice.

Preparation requires each communicator to develop a cache of supplies to help them in fulfilling their communications duties. There are various web sites you can rely on as basic lists in building your “go bag” of supplies. I realize that most of you are on limited budgets regarding the purchase of additional rigs or other related equipment, so improve on what you have with the addition of a better antenna system and upgraded power sources. Keep in mind that you won’t be able to “run home” to get something you’ve forgotten.

There are NO second chances with emergency communications during a hurricane.

Reminders – If by choice or by wallet your only rig is an HT: The battery pack that came with your HT is NOT enough during a deployment. Make sure you have additional power in the form of extra batteries and a power supply. You should have enough “portable power” to last for at least 4 days of operation.

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I would like to congratulate Stuart Rohre K5KVH – Red Cross AEC in Travis and Williamson County.  Stuart received the West Gulf Division Excellence award – as the EMCOMM Ham of the year 2012.  The presentation was made by Coy  Day, retired ARRL West Gulf Division Director and Dr. David Woolweaver – Director of West Gulf Division ARRL.

In receiving the honor Stuart’s first words were in praise of his team mates – Joe Fisher K5EJL and Bob Morgan WB5AOH who have supported W5KA Red Cross Station in many drills and deployments.

A member of Travis County ARES since 1975, Stuart began working with Red Cross in earnest in 1991.  Stuart had his baptism of fire serving Red Cross in the Jarrell Tornadoes of 1997.  He was the first ARES operator at the chapter and was asked to organize communications for the disaster.  Public Safety communications were out!

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The Unusual Suspects UNCLUB group came together in 2006, during that time I think we as a GROUP have done an amazing job of promoting Amateur Radio. I thought I would share some of our events and Activities. It is  these projects and the friendships of an incredible group of people that make me proud to be part of this fine group.   – Greg N5XO

Website: We built a new website, http://www.wx5us.us/, where we featured photos and news from various ham radio events that our members participated in, plus a list of our proud members.

Tower Raising:  I think we have had more tower raising projects than about any group around. Since every thing we do is about Taco’s… it would explain why as a group we seem to be getting fatter {grin}. We have helped  each other raise towers, design systems and improve our stations. I am impressed with our accomplishments. When we first started operating simplex like many ham’s and clubs we relied on repeaters and  our stations showed it … now we have stations that anyone can be proud of … and have outstanding simplex coverage.

In fact within the members of our group…

• we have 3 more tower projects coming along in the next month to month in a half…
• 2 of them 72ft towers with large antenna arrays….

PROMOTING SIMPLEX AND WEAK SIGNAL  is our thing {grin}

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FIELD DAY IS JUNE 22-23rd 2013

I’m currently compiling a list of clubs or individual stations who are making plans for Field Day 2013.  If you want me to share your location and hours of operation (some clubs don’t run full 24 hours, and/or shut down during the night and resume in the morning), please send an email to info@sanantoniohams.org with “Field Day 2013” in the subject line to get my attention. 

Info updated 06/11/2013

Please include any details you want shared, such as a talk-in frequency especially if you are on private property or a hard to find location.  Let us know if there are any admission fees (such as operating from a public or private park, etc.).  If you require RSVP, please provide the official contact info for that purpose.  If you are limiting the hours of operation, such as taking a recess during the middle of the night and resuming the next morning, let me know that also.  I know you don’t just want folks to show up for meal time, especially if they aren’t a member of your club.

After sifting thru the thousands of emails on my computer, I also visited the ARRL official site locator page to see what I could see.

And then I looked for San Antonio / Central Texas area on the map, and said “double wow!”  I know of several clubs not shown on this map, as of today as of 06/11/2013, who plan on conducting a FD event.  Click on the screen shot to the right for details.  The little red map parkers are those FD locations registered as of 06-01-2013 with ARRL.  The little comment boxes are the locations that I’m aware of, where clubs are planning their event.  I’ve added some event stations below, from Bandera,  San Marcos, Austin, Kerrville and Corpus Christi, that do not show up on the San Antonio metro map image that I posted here.

VE Testing Notes: There will be 2 VE Test Sessions active the morning of Field Day in the San Antonio metro area: 

• SARC will be conducting a VE Test Session at 10am on June 22nd, at the Great Northwest Library off Grissom Road & Timberwilde Rd on the NW side of San Antonio. This is their normal date / time / location for such test sessions.  Contact Pat AD5BR at 210-273-5927 or hamtests@gmail.com for info.  Pat will have FD information available that morning for the new hams to go visit afterwards.
• GVARC will be conducting a VE Test Session sometime during the day on Saturday, June 22nd, at the site of their Field Day. See location info listed below. 

CLUBS known to be participating in Field Day in South Central Texas include…

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On Sunday morning, June 2nd, after the rain had passed thru the area, some area ham radio operators showed up at Grumpy’s Shop (ham radio store) to install new antennas and tower, so that hams could use the station inside when the store was open. For many years, the San Antonio Radio Club (SARC – W5SC) had an operating station inside the Kcomm Ham Radio Store on Gulfdale Rd (west side of the airport), but when that store closed a year ago, the club lost their club station.

Grumpy’s Shop is located at 2002 CeeGee Lane, San Antonio, TX 78217.  That’s 2 traffic lights outside (north) of Loop 410, off Broadway, between Broadway and the airport, on the corner of CeeGee Lane and Aero Street.  (Google map link here http://goo.gl/maps/7DX3f )

Our thanks to William DW9HGF/W5 for providing the following photos taken during this operation.  Notice the airplanes taking off in the background?

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Gary over at Grumpy Shop (ham store) is planning to install some antennas on Sunday, June 2nd, starting at 9am.

We were asked to extend an open invitation to any hams wanting to come help, or just watch.   The store will likely be open,  but he is NOT normally open on Sundays.  Store phone 210-829-8030

Grumpy Shop is located at 2002 CeeGee Lane, Zip 78217, which is on the east side of the San Antonio International Airport, off Broadway, north of Loop 410. 

Here is a Google map Link http://goo.gl/maps/mccb7

Directions: From Loop 410 in San Antonio, go north on Broadway to the second traffic light (CeeGee Lane) and turn left (toward the airport).  Go to the end of the street, and Grumpy Shop is on the left corner of that intersection. White one story building with a chain link fence around the side parking lot (Aero Street).