The Importance of Amateur Radio in Communication

[WRUU653]

On 11/23/2024 at 7:40 AM, WRHS218 said:

Everyone knows Progresso  cans are higher gain give you more fars.

Pro tip for newbies regardless of which can you choose make sure to empty it first 

[BoxCar]

2 hours ago, WRUU653 said:

Pro tip for newbies regardless of which can you choose make sure to empty it first 

Full cans act the same as a dummy load.

[SteveShannon]

At least the cans that carry spam are labeled. 
(Even I groaned.)

[WRYZ926]

C-Rat cans use to work great. But that age is long past. You can't make any coms with MRE packaging like you could with C-Rats.

[Willie]

4 hours ago, WRYZ926 said:

 You can't make any coms with MRE packaging like you could with C-Rats.

I thought used MRE packaging is what they are making FRS radios from now. Recycling and all that...

<j/k>

 

[WRKC935]

On 11/21/2024 at 11:55 PM, louie535 said:

Amateur radio, or ham radio, remains a critical tool for communication, especially in emergencies. When disasters disrupt internet and phone networks, ham operators provide a reliable lifeline, coordinating relief and sharing real-time updates using simple, battery-powered equipment.

Beyond emergencies, amateur radio connects people globally, fosters innovation, and serves as a training ground for future engineers and emergency responders. Its independence from centralized systems makes it resilient against cyber threats and infrastructure failures.

In a digital age, amateur radio proves that simple, reliable communication remains vital for connection, safety, and innovation.

Wait, what AI engine created that post?  Or where did it get copied and pasted from? 

Training ground for engineers, and emergency responders?  The engineers thing is laughable at best, and I have NEVER even heard of ham radio being a contributing factor in someone becoming a cop or fire fighter.  Now I have seen MANY a wacker that couldn't get into public safety for various reasons end up with a ham license.  Never the other way around.  Others are welcome to comment here, if they have ever heard such a thing, but I'm not gonna hold out much hope.

The engineer's thing.  Most new hams are not even good appliance operators.  They care little about the quality of their equipment (Baofengs) and for a long time they were getting their license for other reasons like joining a SAR / CERT group and it was sort of a requirement for those groups. 

The continued push that ham radio is for emergency communications promises the ARRL a new batch of members / license holders every time there is some significant incident that other types of communications fail and the otherwise uninformed general public see the statement that "Ham Radio Saves Lives" and go see about getting licensed.  Some get as far as finding out about the tests and that sends them to GMRS or drives them off all together.  A few go the full route and get licensed, buy a radio and listen to it for a month or so and put it in a closet.  VERY few become anything resembling active in the hobby. 

Fostering innovation?

Gonna ask, what innovative thing that had made a significant contribution to radio communications has come out of ham radio in the last 50 years? 

I just had this 'argument' with a bunch of backwards thinking hams that were certain that StarLink was going to be the end of EMCOMM (emergency communications) with regards to ham radio.  And if they don't figure out how to adopt it and other newer technologies, then yes, it might do just that. 

The whole ad-hoc, no infrastructure, radio to radio communications thing is great if two things are present.  First is the distances are short.  No one is going to be of any assistance with a flood or tornado if they are on the other side of the country.  Those sorts of things are localized.  The communications need to be localized as well.  FEMA and other state EMA agencies have all but completely gotten away form HF as a resource, because it's of limited use.  They bring in trailer mounted towers and VHF/UHF/800 equipment to restore communications for public safety. 

So if you have no infrastructure, the other thing you need is enough people to bridge the gap in coverage between where you are and where the people are you need to communicate with.  That requires operators in specific places to relay traffic from you to the other party.  Ham radio was in the past fairly active most places.  Now that activity is significantly lower.  And even if those people are in the right locations, are they going to be willing to participate and pass traffic. 

 

[Raybestos]

3 hours ago, WRKC935 said:

Wait, what AI engine created that post?  Or where did it get copied and pasted from? 

Training ground for engineers, and emergency responders?  The engineers thing is laughable at best, and I have NEVER even heard of ham radio being a contributing factor in someone becoming a cop or fire fighter.  Now I have seen MANY a wacker that couldn't get into public safety for various reasons end up with a ham license.  Never the other way around.  Others are welcome to comment here, if they have ever heard such a thing, but I'm not gonna hold out much hope.

The engineer's thing.  Most new hams are not even good appliance operators.  They care little about the quality of their equipment (Baofengs) and for a long time they were getting their license for other reasons like joining a SAR / CERT group and it was sort of a requirement for those groups. 

The continued push that ham radio is for emergency communications promises the ARRL a new batch of members / license holders every time there is some significant incident that other types of communications fail and the otherwise uninformed general public see the statement that "Ham Radio Saves Lives" and go see about getting licensed.  Some get as far as finding out about the tests and that sends them to GMRS or drives them off all together.  A few go the full route and get licensed, buy a radio and listen to it for a month or so and put it in a closet.  VERY few become anything resembling active in the hobby. 

Fostering innovation?

Gonna ask, what innovative thing that had made a significant contribution to radio communications has come out of ham radio in the last 50 years? 

I just had this 'argument' with a bunch of backwards thinking hams that were certain that StarLink was going to be the end of EMCOMM (emergency communications) with regards to ham radio.  And if they don't figure out how to adopt it and other newer technologies, then yes, it might do just that. 

The whole ad-hoc, no infrastructure, radio to radio communications thing is great if two things are present.  First is the distances are short.  No one is going to be of any assistance with a flood or tornado if they are on the other side of the country.  Those sorts of things are localized.  The communications need to be localized as well.  FEMA and other state EMA agencies have all but completely gotten away form HF as a resource, because it's of limited use.  They bring in trailer mounted towers and VHF/UHF/800 equipment to restore communications for public safety. 

So if you have no infrastructure, the other thing you need is enough people to bridge the gap in coverage between where you are and where the people are you need to communicate with.  That requires operators in specific places to relay traffic from you to the other party.  Ham radio was in the past fairly active most places.  Now that activity is significantly lower.  And even if those people are in the right locations, are they going to be willing to participate and pass traffic. 

 

Regarding your first paragraph, that was my very first thought(s) on reading the OP item.  It was so "cliche'".  No way was it an original item.  Corny, too.  It reminded me of another over-used cliche' item we all probably heard on various TV documentaries, commercials, etc, between the 1970's and 1990's.  Remember the ones that started out, "America has had a years-long love affair........with the automobile."

I agree with pretty much all of the rest of your post.  GovCo has tried to make hams as close to obsolete as possible, for emergencies.  They want to be the alpha and the omega of our needs.  More control, that way.

Many ham clubs have made themselves obsolete and useless by focusing on shiney things rather than utility and usefulness.  One club I was a member of in the late 1990's, had a great local area linked repeater system.  Thinking back over the years, it was probably the only linked repeater system that was worth a cuss, that I ever used.  It covered a big portion of the middle of the state, in and around the state capital.  In those days before everyone had a cell phone in their pocket, or even a cell phone at all for that matter, it allowed ham friends and families in the area to stay connected while on the road.  A couple of blind members, husband and wife, used it so she knew when to expect him home for dinner as he took a handicap bus service with an unreliable itinerary home from work, each day.  An autopatch allowed others whose wives were not hams to call and advise them of their progress getting home from work.  This system was also a great social conduit, keeping many friends in touch, each and every day.

Then the family of a former member, then deceased, put a curse on the group from which it never fully recovered.  Like many non-ham families of deceased hams, none of them wanted his old radios and stuff.  They offered the club his old radios, most bordering on or past obsolescence by then, if the club would build an "Emergency Trailer" and put his name and call sign on the outside.  The jump to claim this guy's old junk was immediate and relentless.  Our repeater system was beginning to suffer from age and neglect.  It needed what funds and resources were available, ASAP.  Suddenly, 110% of all resources (funding and manpower technical expertise) was going into this stupid emergency trailer.  Several of the more level-headed members and myself tried arguing that we needed working repeaters more than a trailer that at most, might be used twice a year for stuff like Field Day, and maybe another special event.  Given recent history, its use, much less "need" in an actual emergency was unlikely.  These cries fell on deaf ears and the majority pushed forward to build the trailer and let the repeaters further atrophy.  As a few of us had predicted, in the years that followed, this must-have emergency trailer saw scant use, and never for a real emergency. 

Membership dwindled as the repeaters deteriorated even more.  At every meeting, a couple of dorks in the club hierarchy would always poll the remaining membership about what we should do to increase membership.  A few of us always responded, "Fix the d-mn repeaters!"  Of course, this always got ignored.  The repeaters all suffered from neglect and became pretty useless.  Membership dwindled.  I left the club as it no longer served any legitimate purpose.  A ham from outside the club patched up the repeaters as a gesture of kindness.  Eventually, for whatever reason, he stepped away.  A statewide (tax funded) group took on fixing the two remaining repeaters, but apparently, somewhere along the line, distanced itself from the club.  Now, that club is soliciting donations for the two remaining repeaters.  

When I was still an ARRL member, I used to laugh at how many clubs nationwide had gotten on the Emergency Trailer bandwagon.  You were nothing unless you or a member of your group had a pic in a recent edition of QST (ham magazine) of yourself or fellow members in your club's trailer, with a mic in your hand, a hard hat on your head, and a traffic vest on your torso. 

Some groups still have it right.  The Mt Mitchell repeater (145.190 MHz) by all accounts, helped get a lot of emergency traffic through in Western North Carolina and East Tennessee, following the Hurricane Helene disaster.  That repeater has provided wide-area coverage across several states for decades.  May its life be long.

[WRYZ926]

The club I belong to suffers from wanting new shiny stuff to go in our ecomm trailer. Luckily there are enough level headed members around to refocus everyone on maintaining our repeaters. There are three of us, including myself, that are on the trailer committee. All three of us get aggravated since most members couldn't care less about using the trailer outside of the once a year field day. At least we don't have any orange vests or hard hats.

We already had one of the widest coverage areas in the state with our 2m repeater. We just replaced the aging repeater with a Motorola Quantar. That made a definite improvement. We also replaced the Raspberry Pi controller with an Arcom RC210 controller. We are now in the process of taking DMR out of our three 70cm repeaters and getting them setup up with AllStar. The plan is to have the three 70cm repeaters always linked and the ability to link them to our 2m repeater when needed.

A few of us ran into a brick wall when it came to getting a GMRS repeater setup. We just did it and then presented it to the club after we had tested it for a coupe of months. It is easier to ask for forgiveness than asking for permission. Half of the guys that were against GMRS now have their GMRS licenses after seeing how well it works. We get the same coverage area with the GMRS repeater as we do with the 70cm repeater at our main site. And the GMRS repeater antennas are at 400 feet versus the 70cm antennas at 900 feet.

[jhutchings]

I am both a ham radio and GMRS operator. I love topics like this. So called SAD hams. Oh I love that term. But in reality I find hams and GMRS operators very friendly and welcome questions and contacts from all operators. Both of our local ham and GMRS clubs are welcoming to all and I have many friends that have both licenses. A lot of us can from CB radio. So radio is radio. It is how you approach it. Just enjoy it and the people you meet. Both have their place. GMRS as you all know operates on fixed frequencies and the types of radios and the power you can use is fixed. Han radio is experimental and it is up to the operator for the most part. Still at the end of the day it is about making a contact from point a to point b. Enjoy the radio and friends you make.