Used my GMRS today for a practical use case

[krvw]

Okay, I'm hooked.

 

I was walking out to our local crop share pickup today when a neighbor texted me and asked if I knew what the huge plume of smoke is rising from near Alexandria, Virginia. Nothing (yet) on the news.

 

I had my radio with me because I was doing a couple of antenna/signal tests anyway, so I hopped on the local repeater and asked for anyone nearby to provide a visual situation report. Within a minute, I had 3 separate responses.

 

Turned out to be a huge construction fire, now at 5 alarms.

 

The local news story hit their web site and alert system > 30 minutes later. (See https://wtop.com/fairfax-county/2020/02/massive-fire-engulfs-fairfax-county-construction-site/)

 

No big deal, I suppose, but I will add that from my vantage point, the smoke was along the glide path into DCA (Reagan National) airport. I'm the son of a retired 747 pilot (and fighter/aerobatics RAF team), so big plumes of smoke near airports have always made me uneasy, since long before 9-11.

 

Anyway, LOVE my GMRS comms now that I've learned about the world of repeaters out there. I'll be taking my Ham technician class exam in a couple weeks as well.

 

I'm hooked.

 

Cheers,

 

Ken (WRFC318)

 

[WRAK968]

There is a reason we are suppose to clear the air for emergency traffic. Sometimes the phones go down, or the battery dies, or we leave them home. Such an incident happened to a family member on her way to work. A vehicle had taken out a pole, continued on into a fenced off area containing a cell tower destroyed a trailer that was in there. The cell tower went down and all cell coverage dropped. Having seen all this, and being an emt, she called by radio and gave me what info she had and her location, I then relayed the info through to the PD using a neighbors phone (We use cell phones so no landline in the house.) Officers were dispatched and driver was charged with DUI.

 

Turns out the trailer was running as a temporary controller until a part could be replaced in the little brick hut next to the tower. When the car struck the trailer it damaged the coax jumper going to the tower and the equipment inside. When it went down the next closest tower was about 5 miles out with heavy pine forests and hills in-between them.