[FLARES] Statewide SET

[Ron Wetjen]

Dave Armbrust wrote:

> While the QNC was sent to ALL FLORIDA AMATEURS in an ideal world that should
> have meant that all Florida Amateurs would have received the QNC.

That is what your post implied.  I'm a Florida Amateur (among many) who 
didn't get the QNC.  You should have said this was passed on local nets 
... thereby reducing ALL Florida Amateurs by quite a "large number" and 
making it more in line of what actually went down.

> While Ron did not state what nets, if any, he check into between 10/2 and
> 10/4 it really should not matter.  If he monitored at least one net he
> should have heard this "Test Priority" QNC read at the very top of the net
> when the net asks for any Emergency or Priority traffic.

There WAS no local net to check into.  While tuning around to find ANY 
activity, I did hear Hillsborough and Orange County active, so monitored 
the local repeater for at least 2 hours with ZERO drill traffic heard or 
mentioned.

> So why did Ron not get this QNC?
> 
> That is a question he needs to ask of the nets that he did check into.

Again, it would help if there actually WAS a net to check into.

If this was such an important event, why didn't a WCF official pass the 
QNC on local repeaters?  I understand several people were looking for a 
WCF representative on "Big Stick" to pass drill traffic ... and there 
were none to be found.  What's up with that?  I heard no mention of or 
drill traffic passed on "Big Stick" during the 2 hours I monitored.

> |  > "Special nets were called and scheduled with check-ins from stations
> |  > operating on emergency power."
> |
> | Must have missed this as well.  I monitored the local repeater for
> | several hours, and heard no such net.  (I did hear an Orange
> | County net in progress on the same repeater frequency.)

You quoted the above, so why ask for the 3rd time

 > While Ron did not state what nets, if any, he check into between 10/2 
 > and 10/4 it really should not matter."

<deep sigh>   There   was   no   net   to   check   into.

> |  > Armbrust said he was impressed by the number of stations that had
> |  > emergency power capability. "A large number had generators
> |  > and large  quantities of fuel on hand," he said.

> Ron, I can assure you that everything that appeared in the ARRL letter
> regarding the Florida SET was accurate and not exaggerated

Of course it was ... there are no specific details to suggest otherwise! 
I was just curious to hear what kind of numbers were involved.  Tens, 
Hundreds, Thousands?  A "large number" is quite vague.  Someone reading 
this may ask the same thing and think "thousands" of Amateurs took part, 
making them think "Man, they've got their act together".  If it was only 
"tens", then we need help BIG TIME!  When someone then expects 
"thousands" of Amateurs to help ... and only "tens" show up ... they'll 
go back to your report, and ask you, where is the "large number" of 
Amateurs you wrote about?  If you can't (or don't want to) give any 
accurate numbers, then don't mention it at all.  It's misleading 
information ... and it makes things look better than they may actually 
have been ... which in my book, is exaggeration.

> It has also been written on this reflector "Yeah, the silence IS deafening
> isn't it?" regarding the SET."  Let me also assure you that nothing could be
> further from the truth.

This reflector was set up for folks to share their ideas, plans, results 
of drills, etc., so others can learn from others how to improve their 
own programs.  Silence is not sharing.  If a "large number" were active, 
why was there 1 report from Seminole County?  Where are the other 66 (or 
however many were active)?  On other reflectors I'm on ... folks are 
ALWAYS willing to share tips, give advice, or ask for help ... someone 
almost always has an answer.  Why is this one so different?  Everyone 
here is interested in having the best prepared and trained groups that 
they can have.  Where are the tips, advice, or reports that might give 
others ideas how to do things better?

> While it was not a perfect drill, no one expected it to be.  That is why we
> have drills to find and identify problems.

And if everyone would share their experiences, someone else might say 
"we solved that same problem, by doing this ..." thereby saving that 
group (and possibly many others) from reinventing the wheel and making 
the same mistakes over and over again.

> Still, overall I was pleased with the first State Wide SET we conducted.

And it's a good thing.  I just would like to see more sharing among 
groups what they did.  I'd also like to data to know what a "large 
number" actually is.  Some, a few, a bunch, a large number doesn't tell 
me anything.  56, 125, 523, 1280, 5432 ... those are REAL numbers which 
we can grasp and help us judge the extent of participation.

73, Ron