[TVARC] Thanks and Happy Holidays

[selahmc at att.net]

Hello TVARC friends,

 

I'm Mike Cronin (KB1WOA), a new member since June of this year.  I just
wanted to thank you folks for the informative emails.for someone new, it
helps to stay connected and read about all the fine things going on in the
club while remote.  We cannot be in the Villages till next year (still at
our home in NH due to medical), so I'll have a bit of a wait until I can
attend the club meetings in person.  

 

Wishing you all a very Happy Holiday season.73

--Mike

 

P.S.     Here's an exciting story from here in NH this week.interesting
reading about the value of our hobby:

 

"When all else fails, Amateur Radio" proved to be more than just the ARRL
tagline on Sunday December 11, 2022.

 

An elderly New Hampshire man went out for a day hike with his dog yesterday
in the Belmont area of central New Hampshire.  Things went well, until his
cellphone battery died.  With the oncoming snow and darkness, a leisurely
day hike was quickly turning into a serious health and safety issue for the
hiker.

 

Fortunately for him he is also an amateur radio operator and had his DMR HT
with him.  With no cell phone capability, he made a call on a DMR NH
statewide channel through the Gunstock DMR repeater seeking assistance. His
call was answered by Bill Barber, NE1B who was monitoring the channel.   The
hiker asked Bill to call his wife as he could not text or get pinged with
his dead cell phone.  Bill contacted the hiker/ham's wife, and she was glad
to hear that someone was in contact with him.  Unfortunately, he did not
know exactly where he was and believed he would have to walk through brush
for an hour or more to get to a road.

 

His wife called in the local PD who began a search along with their FD. Ham
radio was the only communication from about 4:30 to 6:30 PM.   Bill called
up Rick Zach, K1RJZ, who lives closer to the search area, and he was
familiar with the area snow mobile trails and roads.  Rick coordinated
communication between the responding police units and the lost ham on the NH
Statewide talk group.

 

The police and fire units attempted to assist in the search by activating
their sirens in different locations to try to obtain a location on the ham,
however, he was not able to hear them.

 

Another ham Chuck Cunningham, K1MIZ, was monitoring the events on net watch
and noticed that the lost ham had accidentally changed channels.  This
information was passed along and 2 meter DMR communication continued until
the lost ham walked out to a road and could advise where he was.  The search
and checkout ended successfully at 6:30 PM.

 

Thanks to the efforts of Bill, NE1B, Rich, K1RJZ and Chuck, K1MIZ the
wayward ham is going to be able to enjoy another Christmas holiday with his
family.

 

Bill listed some very important lessons learned from the incident -

 

Radio batteries last longer on DMR radios than on analog mode.

Even his wife had trouble on her cell phone coverage at home Monitor your
local State DMR channel for helping others nearby You may want to program
146.52 FM next to your State channel for signal strength DFing if and when
out of repeater range.  Some hams still monitor 52!

But stay on the primary channel until you know more hams are nearby to DF
Hike with DMR.  Our network sites cover many areas of New England that do
not have any cell service Hike with a flashlight

 

And I would like to add one more item to the list.  My son is one of the
leaders of Pemi Search & Rescue and unfortunately responds to too many calls
for lost hikers.  One very important item that he stresses is that hikers
file a "flight plan".  Let someone who is not going on the hike know where
you are going, how long you expect to be gone and what communication
equipment or capability you have with you.  This also applies if you are
going out hunting, fishing or boating.

 

 

Raul "Skip" Camejo - AC1LC

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