Author: Eli W7ELI

Your leadership Team got together for an all-day workshop to lay out the plan for the coming year. We went over the survey responses and tried to incorporate as many of the suggestions as were workable. The calendar of training and events that resulted is at the end of this newsletter. Many of you requested more hands-on training, and we attempted to address that need. The BEST way to get hands-on training is to participate in SETs, exercises, and public service events. We will let you know about as many of these as we can via the website, the newsletter, and announcements at our monthly meetings.

At the request of our County Emergency Manager, Chris Voss, we will also be putting a strong emphasis on digital radio communications. We are launching our Packet RMS Radio Operator Certification. Look for the task list on the MCARES website under the Training tab. We encourage all ARROs to get this certification.

The Portland NET program is about to launch their own ARO training program! It is modeled after our own ARRO training and is tailored to the specific needs of the NET program. For those NET hams who would like to be more involved with emergency amateur radio communications, becoming a member of MCARES, joining the Rover team, and participating in our meetings, exercises, and public events is encouraged.

I will be conducting three sets of ARRO workshops in the coming year. All new provisional members should attend these workshops after completing the FEMA IS-100, IS-200, and IS-700 on-line courses. This is a slight change from the past in that we are asking all members who are not yet ARRO certified to attend these workshops, and the ICS classes must be completed before attending the workshops.

The Drill from Home on September 12 went very well. Several participants have said it was a valuable experience and should be repeated. There’s a good chance we’ll be doing it again next year. Everyone did very well formatting and sending their NTS messages, going off frequency to exchange messages and dealing with the scratchy signals encountered on simplex. Thank you to all who participated and a special thanks to the simplex frequency monitors who gave valuable feedback and suggestions to the message handlers and to net control (me).

We will be doing a year-end member survey again this year. It will be shorter than last year, just asking for any contact info changes and finding out what we did right and where we can improve. Watch for it probably in November and please take the time to fill it out.

Our training at the general meeting this month will be Traffic Handling. We will split into basic and advanced groups with Michael AE7XP presenting the basics to include similarities and differences between NTS Radiograms and ICS 213s. He will cover sending and receiving protocols and how to format a simple NTS radiogram. I will present the advanced portion and cover more of the complexities of NTS traffic, book traffic, ARL numbered radiograms and how to deal with a complex emergency management form when the receiving station doesn’t have the blank form.

Our Drill from Home on September 12 will be based on this training. Participants will create an NTS radiogram message, then check into the command net. Net control will pair up AROs and send them to a simplex frequency to exchange their messages. The simplex frequencies will be monitored by an experienced traffic handler who can offer guidance and correction. AROs will report back to the command net when they have sent and received a message and then they will be dismissed.

I will be presenting another ARO Basics workshop on September 3 and a Traffic Handling workshop on September 17. These workshops are for new/provisional members to get them on their way to ARRO certification. They cover all the items on the ARRO task list. If anyone else needs a refresher, let me know and I will get you in if there is room.

The July meeting is one of our most popular. It’s an informal time to socialize and see everyone’s latest go kits from the humblest HT to the most robust of portable radio gear. Our trailer will be there for all to check out as well. Also I know some of our members have some great personal survival gear from tents to cookware to meals, so bring the items that are interesting and fun to share. If you missed Field Day, this is the next best thing.

Thanks to Steve W7SRH and John KG7JKN for volunteering to write feature articles for our newsletter. They will alternate months with Steve giving us a great Field Day piece this month.

The June meeting will be presented by Adam. I’ll let him tell you about it:

The training topic for June is going to be a little different. We’ll be talking about how to program the memories of your radios with a computer. We’re also going to quickly break into a programming party for those of you who would like to get your radios programmed with the latest ARES frequency template.

As you are aware, setting up the memories in your radio via your computer is so much easier and faster than manual entry, especially if you have several hundred memories to set up. Programming via computer also makes it harder to make mistakes, since the program is watching that you don’t enter crazy stupid things – like trying to set a frequency of 100,000 GHz for example.

Programming via computer also makes it more likely all the ARES members have similar setups. If there’s a strong culture of programming in the unit, leadership can just start to send out template file updates for events, drills and incidents that use different frequencies than we have in our “standard,” eliminating the need for you to spend an hour the morning of the event trying to get the frequencies set up, or showing up without the frequencies set up at all and looking around for people to program your radio for you. At the meeting, we’ll be talking about the programs you can use to program your radio, systems to organize and manage your frequency templates, factory vs RT vs Ebay cables, and similar topics.

If you bring your radio and your programming cable, there will be stations available to get your radio updated with the current template at the meeting. If you don’t have a programming cable for your radio, someone might have one that you can borrow to get your radio flashed at the meeting. But you should get a cable, if you don’t have one, as soon as you can.

If you are an old hand at programming your radio, we’d love your help for the meeting! Bring your laptop and cables and help us program radios! If you’re interested, drop kf7ljh [at] arrl [dot] net a note and we can talk that through.

Adam KF7LJH

We now have 56 ARRO certified, 15 Net Control certified, and 13 HF certified members.

All members should have received the revised training schedule. The Traffic Handling training has been rescheduled for the August meeting and the NTS Traffic Drill From Home has been moved from June 20 to September 12.

I’m excited about the Radio Camp Out August 15-16. We’ll play with our HF and 2 meter go kits, HTs, and the trailer. Robert and Adam will be training on HF and signing HF certification check sheets for those who want their HF certification. Or just come and hang out in the woods with us for the day or overnight.

By request of the SEC, Vince Van Der Hyde K7VV, we have new instructions for how to use the ICS 309 Communication Log form. I have redone our version of the 309 to conform and I think it will be much easier to log messages this way. The form will be introduced at the May general meeting. It is already posted on the website. Please purge your electronic and paper files of all old 309 forms! You’re going to like the new one much better!

Training for the May meeting is Traffic Handling, and from the last SET and the Deployment Tour last Saturday, everyone needs a refresher. Please come and hone your traffic handling skills. We will divide into two groups, one for basic message handling presented by Michael AE7XP, and one for experienced message handlers which will cover book traffic, using ARRL numbered radiograms, more extensive NTS protocols for how to send email addresses and URLs in the text of a message and other nitty gritty details.

The training topic for the April general meeting has changed. Traffic Handling is postponed until May.

There will be an ARRO Basics Workshop on May 7 and a Traffic Handling and Communication Log Workshop on May 21, both at our usual ARES meeting place. These workshops are for new members and any other members not yet ARRO certified. Contact me, eliza [dot] pride [at] gmail [dot] com, if you wish to attend these workshops.

We have had a wonderful bunch of new members eager to learn and get certified. We have added seven new ARROs in the past month. We have a total of 47 ARES/RACES Radio Operators (ARROs) now, 15 Net Control and Field Operators (NCFOs), and 12 HF Operators. Pretty awesome, I’d say! Congratulations and thank you to all who have put in the time and effort to get these certifications!

There will be a Net Control workshop on April 16, an ARRO Basics workshop on May 7, and a Traffic Handling and Comm Log workshop on May 21, all at our usual ARES meeting place. Contact me eliza [dot] pride [at] gmail [dot] com if you wish to attend any of these workshops.

Hoodview Amateur Radio Club is offering a Technician licensing class March 7 & 14, and a General license upgrade class on the same dates. Contact Ed Clulow at 503-257- 4822 or n7tl [at] comcast [dot] net.

March 19 will be another Third Thursday Workshop on traffic handling at 6:30 PM at Fire Station 2. This is open to anyone who needs to get checked off on traffic handling and ICS 309 Communication Log for their ARRO certification. Space permitting, others who just want more practice with ICS 213 and NTS radiogram traffic are welcome. Please register by contacting me at eliza [dot] pride [at] gmail [dot] com.