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Subj: ARES E-Letter April 20, 2011
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The ARES E-Letter April 20, 2011
Editor: Rick Palm, K1CE
In This Issue:
ARESİ Briefs
ARESİ Digest
EmCommWest 2011 Next Month in Reno
Sure-Fire Ways to Kill Your ARESİ Program
Setting Up a Twitter Alert System
Letters
New to ARESİ?
The 2011 National Hurricane Conference
K1CE For a Final
ARESİ Briefs
------------
By Friday, March 25, Japan Amateur Radio League (JARL) HQ stations had
completed disaster relief communications on the 7 MHz band for the
catastrophic northeastern Japan earthquake and tsunami of March 11. The JARL
thanked radio amateurs for their cooperation in keeping 7.030 MHz clear for
the relief communications effort. [March 28, 2011, statement, JARL]. A
report can be found here
Amateur Radio Emergency Communications Enhancement Bills
Of the two versions of the Amateur Radio Emergency Communications
Enhancement Act of 2011, H.R. 81 and S. 191, the latter is expected to move
through the Senate before H.R. 81 is taken up by the House. Quiet efforts
are underway to smooth the path of the legislation through the committees of
jurisdiction. [ARRL Executive Committee, March 19, 2011]. Current
information on both measures, and on HR 607 - The Broadband for First
Responders Act of 2011, which poses a threat to our 70-cm band, can be found
here. [Editor's note: Although I have not used it extensively at this point,
I have found GovTrack.us to be an easy-to-use site for tracking
congressional bills, events, individual members of Congress, and so forth.
Although not vetted by myself nor ARRL, readers might want to try it, too,
and please let me know of your experience.]
The ARESİ E-Letter audio version is now available on iTunes: Click here.
Here is a very well done film on the issue of Interoperability, which should
be required viewing for ARESİ members who want to gain a greater
understanding of the issues facing both our own service, and our served
agencies. -- Les Rayburn, N1LF, Alabaster, Alabama
ARRL Partners Roundup
April 18, 2011 -- Red Cross Responds After Tornadoes, Wildfires Leave
Devastation Across The South
April 18, 2011 - Salvation Army: Response Efforts to Deadly Tornadoes,
Wildfires Across Southern US
ARESİ Digest
------------
Wicked Tornadoes Rip Up the South; SKYWARN, ARES Respond
Devastating tornadoes swept through the southern portion of the country over
the course of the last few days, and after-action reports so far are
sketchy, but your editor reached a few key ARESİ officials for some early
indications of responses. ARESİ and SKYWARN were activated in Atoka,
Oklahoma and other areas of the state, especially the northeast and
southeast, for the tornado emergencies, according to Oklahoma SEC Mark
Conklin, N7XYO. Oklahoma ARRL Public Information Coordinator Lloyd Colston,
KC5FM, reported that last Friday was a very busy day for the state, as it
faced wildfire emergencies in the west and the tornadoes in the southeast.
Both SKYWARN and ARESİ were involved, said Colston: "These two groups of
volunteers are married together for these types of situations. They work
extremely well."
Alabama SM David Drummond, W4MD, said that many areas in western Alabama
were activated, particularly in Sumter, Tuscaloosa and Greene counties,
where tornadoes were on the ground. Numerous ARESİ nets across the state
were convened in support of these areas. SKYWARN spotters reported ground
truths back to the National Weather Service offices in Birmingham via
multiple modes, including D-STAR. Damage assessments were also provided to
the Red Cross at Tuscaloosa, and the State EMA at Clanton. SEC Greg Gross,
K4GR, called the Alabama ARES State Net on 3965 kHz, which was in session
for more than six hours. Activity reports are still coming into the Section
Manager and a more comprehensive report is pending.
In North Carolina, SM Bill Morine, N2COP, said "storms resulted in the most
lives lost in the state due to a natural disaster since 1984 with 23
confirmed dead. Because devastation was highly localized due to the narrow
swath of many of the tornadoes, there were few communications outages.
Nevertheless, SKYWARN was active, and ARESİ operators were on standby for
much of the weekend."
From Tom Brown, N4TAB, North Carolina SEC: "Triad SKYWARN (Winston-Salem,
Greensboro, High Point) activated under the Raleigh NWS, reporting events as
the storm line developed, intensified and moved east. As it cleared their
jurisdiction, ARESİ Triad operators provided reports into Central Carolina
SKYWARN about conditions on the back side of the storm line. John Hamilton,
NC4JH, is the Triad SKYWARN EC.
"Central Carolina SKYWARN also activated under Raleigh NWS. It was very busy
for many hours with rotating staff of at least two full-time operators on
the air taking reports for the NWS and picking up the nets as reports were
passed to the NWS. When the NWS office was evacuated to safe quarters, the
SKYWARN operators moved with the NWS staff and continued their activities
without interruption. That was an absolutely exemplary example of "how to do
it right." Virginia Enzor, NC4VA, is the Central Carolina SKYWARN EC.
"Wilson County ARESİ activated under Wilson County EM for about five hours,
handling damage reports. George Diering, W3GJD, is the Wilson County EC.
"SEC Tom Brown, N4TAB, logged into and monitored the State Emergency
Management WebEOC system for 20+ hours, maintaining situational awareness
(SA). Most state ARES jurisdictions also maintained SA for the duration of
the events. We had offers of boots-on-the-ground support from across the
state and from surrounding states, from both ARESİ and MARS."
The Newport, North Carolina, NWS SKYWARN operators in the northeastern part
of the state, headed by SKYWARN EC John Hopkins, KJ4EJH, had two busy net
controls, Pat Gorman, KE4WZY, and Tom Young, KF4VOL. Bertie County, a rural
county, was hard hit but served well by the Newport NWS group.
In Virgina, Section Manager Carl Clements, W4CAC, reported that SKYWARN nets
were activated throughout the state, sending reports to NWS offices,
including the Wakefield NWS facility.
----
See also the above stories on Red Cross and Salvation Army involvement. They
are both ARRL partners pursuant to formal and longstanding memorandums of
understanding (MOU).
Western PA Tornado Response
March 30, 2011 -- Western Pennsylvania hams responded to a tornado
emergency. At approximately 4:30 on the afternoon of Wednesday, March 23,
severe thunderstorms started to roll into Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania,
producing golf ball-sized hail and heavy winds. Members of the Westmoreland
County Public Service/ARESİ group were involved. Learn More. -- ARRL Letter
Southern Cal Hospital Support Hams Fill In Communications Gap
March 25, 2011 - Hospital Disaster Support Communications System (HDSCS)
amateurs provided backup communications when phones failed at a southern
California hospital. When nurses and other caregivers picked up their phones
at Children's Hospital of Orange County (CHOC) in California in the early
morning on March 21, there was no dial tone. A power surge caused the
central processor in the hospital's phone switch to fail. Following
established procedures, the Lead Operator at the CHOC switchboard
immediately used an off-switch tie-line to reach April Moell, WA6OPS, head
of this ARESİ group that specializes in helping hospitals when their
communications fail. More here.
Just 15 days later, HDSCS was activated again to another Orange County
hospital. A group pager alert at 10:28 AM on April 5 brought hams to
Saddleback Hospital in Laguna Hills after a digital equipment failure caused
the inbound and outbound trunk lines to become inoperative. Again, the phone
number of April Moell, WA6OPS was given to Orange County Communications
agency so that ambulance companies and other hospitals could contact
Saddleback Hospital via HDSCS. The outage lasted until 6 PM that day.
Of the 115 times that HDSCS has been activated for communications problems
in Orange County hospitals, this was the 85th time that it was due to
switchgear or cable failure. According to WA6OPS, who is an ARES DEC, "Many
hams around the state and the country ask me why Orange County has so many
phone system failures in hospitals. They seem to think that this doesn't
happen in their own areas, but they're mistaken. We know from our own
experience that phone equipment isn't 100% reliable. I know from talking to
lots of hospital disaster planners around the country that they have plenty
of failures, too. But far too often, hams think that Amateur Radio can only
help in 'all else fails' disasters such as hurricanes, tornados and floods.
Most ham emergency groups don't prepare and plan to help in these
single-hospital incidents. They don't set up 24-hour alerting plans for the
hospitals to use to contact them quickly when phones go down, so they never
get the call."
Moell continues, "When a nurse on a hospital unit has an urgent need to
contact a patient's physician at his office or home but the phones are down
because switchgear has failed, that's just as severe an emergency as it
would be in a widespread natural disaster. Orange County hospitals know and
appreciate us because we come when they call and we connect their staff
members to the outside, no matter the cause of the communications outage. We
urge other ARES groups around the country to adopt our hospital support
model, which includes robust alerting plans for each hospital, regular
meetings with the hospital disaster planners, and ready-to-respond members
who are trained in the special terminology and communications needs of
medical facilities." More information about HDSCS and its successful model
for hospital communications support is at the group's Web site. -- Joe
Moell, K0OV, Fullerton, California
Bergen, New Jersey Members Active in Flooding Emergency
Hams from the Bergen Amateur Radio Association (BARA) provided
communications for the Red Cross of Northern New Jersey. The five day
response was in support of relief efforts in the wake of severe flooding
that occurred in the area in early March. BARA hams leading the effort were
Tony Izzo, K2AMI; Phil Barber, WA2LXE; and Bob Javits, WB2AIU.
Operating from a permanent station installed by BARA at Red Cross Disaster
Relief headquarters in Ridgewood, New Jersey, the hams maintained contact
with the Disaster Assessment Teams covering the flooded areas and relayed
their reports to various departments as needed. Communications operations
involved the use of the repeater of the 10-70 Repeater Association as it
provided excellent coverage of the flood area. According to Rob Pavlick,
Response Manager for the Red Cross, "The continuing support from BARA for
our efforts here in Northern New Jersey has resulted in a more timely flow
of information, and data collection." Red Cross Disaster Assessment
volunteers who are also hams provided the input from the field.
West Texas Wildfires Response
On April 9 at 4:15 PM, ARRL West Texas District 5 EC Bob Ward, WA5ROE,
received a call from Jeff Davis County (Texas) Fire Marshal Stewart
Billingsley, N5HXZ. Billingsley informed Ward that a fire had begun in the
West Texas town of Marfa and was rapidly approaching Fort Davis, 22 miles to
the northeast.
"Stewaryear's keynote ARRL speaker will be Mike Corey, W5MPC,
Emergency Response and Planning Manager from ARRL HQ. Corey will share the
latest in the world of emergency communications and what we can look forward
to having just passed the 75th Anniversary of ARESİ. The Saturday night
banquet speaker will be honored, special guest former ARRL President Jim
Haynie, W5JBP, who served three terms as League president, and made major
contributions to Amateur Radio, including "The Big Project" to attract young
people into the hobby. His key support for emergency communications is
well-known. More event info here. -- ARRL Sacramento Valley Section News,
March 2011
Sure-Fire Ways to Kill Your ARESİ Program
-----------------------------------------
Last month, I offered what I believe are ten ways to grow an ARESİ or EMCOMM
program. This month, I'll offer a list of ways to do just the opposite. Most
are related to leadership.
Politics - If you've been around a while, you've experienced the evil of
Amateur Radio politics, often made worse because we're a passionate bunch
and nobody really has an important (job, money, family) stake in the debate.
ARESİ is different. We have a public safety mission and people count on us.
We do not have time for politics.
A commitment to community service and mission can fill the vacuum politics
would otherwise be drawn into. Before you "start something" or play someone
else's games, ask yourself, "Is this really worth it?" Sometimes you'll say
"yes," but "no" is often a wiser, long-term decision. The best way to avoid
politics is honesty and obvious goodwill.
Failure to communicate and delegate - This is absolutely key. One of the
best ways to keep volunteers - arguably the only way - is to give the ones
who want something to do a task they can do and want to do. You need to
match the task to the volunteer and be careful to match the task and
deadline to the volunteer's reliability. Getting others involved is the key
to your group's success. Train these people to become your leaders.
Obviously, you need people to know what your plans are, what you need, and
what progress is being made. A weekly e-mail is a good way to accomplish
this. Monthly is probably too infrequent. If you can't fill at least a short
weekly newsletter, you probably are not doing enough to be an active group.
Not loving your volunteers - Hot news: As a leader, you can't accomplish
very much working alone. Your job is creating excellent volunteer
experiences and keeping your volunteers involved, fulfilled, and happy. If
you don't really love your volunteers, not merely respect or like them, but
love them, you will fail. Think of your volunteers as an extended family and
get them to think of each other the same way. Be the example.
Forgetting to say "Thanks!" - A wise manager once told me that there is
really onle Teams (CERT)
working together. See my article in May, 2011 QST for more on that. Do what
works in your area, but you may be better off creating new hams than
re-recruiting the burnout cases.
Last month, I recommended one-day HamCram licensing events as a growth tool.
Not everyone agreed, so here is my response to a HamCram critic. How to do a
HamCram? Click here.
Not investing in relationships - The primary job of ARESİ leaders isn't
radio, it's relationships -- with volunteers, agencies, one another, allied
groups, etc. If you put your time and effort into building relationships
among people, your communications capabilities will improve by multiples.
Personal burnout - Leaders need to look after one another as well as
themselves. If you need help, support, or cheering up, ask for it,
especially from the leaders you have created. You can always drop me a note,
too.
I'd like to tell you I am an expert at all these things, but it would be a
lie. Still, these are what I try to focus on: Excellent volunteer and
program management. Members make the ARESİ world go 'round. - David Coursey,
N5FDL, Contributing Editor (visit his blog)
Setting Up a Twitter Alert System
---------------------------------
One tool that might be useful for some groups is Twitter for rapidly sending
out club, group or ARESİ alerts or announcements. Anyone who has a cell
phone that can send and receive text messages can easily enable these alerts
to show up on their phones; no smart phone or complicated setup required!
Setting up a new Twitter account takes just a few minutes, and for your
members to sign up to receive updates is even faster. To set up a new
account visit http://www.twitter.com and look for the "Sign Up" button on
the right side. For the name, put the name of your ARESİ group or club. For
the username, think carefully about this one as it will be in your URL
address, and you won't want to change it later. For the Santa Cruz,
California ARESİ group I chose a naming scheme of "ares_xcz" with the plan
that if multiple ARESİ groups were listed they would be shown together
alphabetically. Then I used a three letter county abbreviation. I created
the main account, <http://twitter.com/ares_xcz> for official ARESİ
activations and alerts.
Next, choose a password. I would create a strong password that you might
share with just a few people in your group so they could post the alert if
you were unavailable. Board members or the club president would be some
examples of who you might grant posting access to.
Next, put in an e-mail address (your own, or a club email address) that gets
monitored regularly. Answer the other simple questions asked and click the
"Create my account" button. You can then customize your page if you choose,
add your organization logo, and write a description of the group with a link
to your website for more information.
To post a "Tweet" or an alert to your group, simply type the text in the
"What's happening?" box at the top and hit the "Tweet" button. Remember,
Tweets are limited to 140 characters so they are easy to read on cellular
phones via SMS, so keep it short. Your tweet is available to anyone who
looks at your Twitter account or uses the search feature. A common method is
to post the short alert message with a link to additional information. For
our group I also created a second Twitter account for more general news and
non-priority information like meeting reminders and announcements:
<http://twitter.com/ares_xcz_news>
Signing Up To Receive Twitter Alerts
For your group members to sign up to receive alerts is easy. From their
mobile phone they would simply create a new text message. In the "To" field
of the message is where you typically put the cellular phone number of who
you want to send the message to, but in this case, Twitter's number is
40404, so place that in the "To" field of the message.
In the message portion, simply write the word "follow" and the name of the
Twitter account for your organization. As an example, to follow all alerts
for the Santa Cruz California ARESİ group, the message would be "follow
ares_xcz".
Send that message and Twitter will reply with a few very basic instructions.
The next time the organization posts a tweet, your phone will receive a texteven if the network is flooded to capacity with voice and data
traffic, as long as the phones can tell the network that they exist, they
can send a text message. This suggests that SMS may not be an altogether bad
way to make initial contact with your ARESİ team.
On transportation, dogma seems to limit it to the emcomm truck, van or
trailer. Bicycles don't seem to be part of our plans, though, not even for
getting to fixed locations. I've gone bicycle mobile for parades, and I've
also seen bicycle mobile use in marathon event communications systems. Just
a thought. - Chris Bohn, N0RZT/4, Navarre, Florida [editor's note: Here in
Florida, we see many public safety officials riding dirt bikeswith knobby
tires, with hand-held radios on their belts. Bicycle use could be good for
ARESİ operators, too - plus, it's good exercise! - K1CE]
Easy-To-Use HTs
We need a national dialogue on what constitutes an easily usable hand-held
radio that can be handed to anyone in an emergency and operated on the spot.
All of the HTs that I own require that the operator have the manual close by
in order to be able to program them. They are all different.
In a major disaster event, granted, many hams who have hand-helds know how
to use them and will be instantly successful in communicating. But if you
think about asking many other hams to get out in the field and help, they
may not know how to program their units, or borrowed units, beyond the basics.
The KISS principle dictates that a simple hand-held for quick-study and
emergency use be marketed. The simplest HT I can remember using was the
Kenwood TH-22 radio with thumbwheel switches on the top (hard to knock off
frequency) and dip switches on the front to choose the PL tone. Simple
switches on the back selected offset and power levels. If an operator was
handed one, he/she would quickly be able to get it into operation on
frequency almost immediately.
I think you should start a dialogue in your newsletter about what we need,
and what models are already available that are simple to use. - Bob Skaggs,
KB5RX, Santa Fe, New Mexico [editor's note: I reviewed the ICOM IC-V80 in
the Product Review column in March 2011 QST - it seemed to fill the bill as
prescribed by Skaggs. - K1CE]
New to ARESİ?
-------------
Here are some basic sources of good ARESİ information:
The ARRL Public Service Communications Manual (PSCM) is the bible for ARES
and NTS operators.
For field operators, check out the ARES Field Resources Manual. It is a
quick trainer and field resource guide for the emergency communicator.
Find local ARES activity and organizations in your area here.
The 2011 National Hurricane Conference
--------------------------------------
As this E-Letter is getting ready to head out the virtual door Amateur Radio
is being well represented at the 2011 National Hurricane Conference in
Atlanta, Georgia.
The ARRL is being represented by Southeast Division Director Greg Sarratt,
W4OZK, and ARRL HQ is being represented by Emergency Preparedness Assistant
Ken Bailey, K1FUG. There are presentations planned on a variety of topics of
interest to Amateur Radio.
Stay tuned for a full report in next month's ARES E-Letter.
K1CE For a Final
----------------
I dusted off an older editorial I wrote for QST a number of years ago, and
thought I would replay it now as it is still relevant, perhaps even more so
today. It also appears in the ARRL's Public Service Communications Manual:
Meeting the communications needs of served agencies is a challenging, and
often daunting proposition in today's complex post-9/11 disaster/emergency
relief arena. With the proliferation of emergency relief organizations,
increasingly sophisticated needs, all competing for that scarce resource --
the volunteer -- coupled with the emergence of other non-ARESİ amateur
providers, it's enough to make an operator's head spin. As more of the
population moves to disaster-prone areas, and less government funding is
available, more pressure is consequently placed on agencies to appropriately
use the volunteer sector for support of their missions in disaster mitigation.
The League's formal relationships with served agencies are vitally important
and valuable to radio amateurs. They provide us with the opportunitybstantial benefit not to be overlooked is that the
relationships lend legitimacy and credibility for Amateur Radio's public
service capability, and that is important when it comes time to defend our
frequencies and privileges before the FCC and Congress. So, ARRL's
relationships with the emergency/disaster relief world need to be nurtured.
What to do? First, it is imperative that a detailed local operational plan
be developed with agency managers in the jurisdiction that set forth
precisely what each organization's expectations are during a disaster
operation. ARESİ and agency officials must work jointly to establish
protocols for mutual trust and respect. Make sure they know who the
principle ARESİ official is in the jurisdiction. All matters involving
recruitment and utilization of ARESİ volunteers are directed by him/her, in
response to the needs assessed by the agency involved.
Make sure ARESİ counterparts in these agencies are aware of ARESİ policies,
capabilities and perhaps most importantly, resource limitations. Let them
know that ARESİ may have other obligations to fulfill with other agencies,
too. Technical issues involving message format, security of message
transmission, disaster welfare inquiry policies and others should be
reviewed and expounded upon in the detailed local operations plans.
Another challenge ARESİ faces is the number of agencies that demand
communications support during a disaster. A local ARESİ unit only has so
much to go around, and it can't possibly meet every agency's needs. While
the League maintains several formal Memoranda of Understanding (MOU) with
disaster and emergency response agencies including the Federal Emergency
Management Agency (FEMA), National Weather Service, Salvation Army, Red
Cross, National Communications System and Associated Public- Safety
Communications Officials - International. These documents merely set forth a
framework for possible cooperation at the local level. While they are
designed to encourage mutual recognition, cooperation and coordination, they
should not be interpreted as to commit, obligate or mandate in any way that
an ARESİ unit must serve a particular agency, or meet all of its needs, in a
jurisdiction. MOUs are "door openers," to help you get your foot in the
door. It's up to you to decide whether or not to pursue a local operational
plan with an agency, a decision that will be based on a number of factors
including the local needs of the agency and the resources you have available
to support those needs, given that you may have other prioritized
commitments as well.
To address this, sit down with your fellow ARESİ members, EC and SEC, and
determine what agencies are active in your area, evaluate each of their
needs, and which ones you are capable of meeting. Then prioritize these
agencies and their needs. After you're all in agfilled with news and features), the ARRL Contest Update (bi-weekly
contest newsletter), Division and Section news -- and much more!
ARRL offers a wide array of products to enhance your enjoyment of Amateur
Radio. Visit the site often for new publications, specials and sales.
Donate to the fund of your choice -- support programs not funded by member
dues!
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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