2005 Kanawha Amateur Radio Club - ARRL Field Day Operations - Coonskin Park Area 73

[ilovenbcnews]

Because the hams serve as a backup means of communications for those agencies when needed. They do have "higher end" gear in most cases, however when the systems that they need to use the gear goes down, then they have to rely on the hams for support. As far as using are ham radios to communicate with the fire/police directly, the answer is no, we are not allowed to transmit on frequencies that were are not licensed for, and those frequencies are not covered by our licenses.

[life25curious]

Look Im a young ham...I'm 25 I know about all the things this guy was talking about. Amateurs are written into emergency plans for one simple reason. Technology is advancing. There is no other form of communication which does not require some kind of other source to transmit the signal to the other station. (Station includes your cell phone...Where do you think Cell phones came from? Walkie Talkies of course. Remember the brick phones from the 80's? Cell coverage wasnt so good back then.)

[masjta]

Why would a kid want to spend a small fortune on radio equipment and sit at a table or desk waiting for some other person to turn there radio on so they can talk to them when they can get up from the desk grab there fourty nine dollar texting facetime video phone and go anywhere they want and put it in there pocket and leave it on to wait for another text while they enjoy other things

[ICOM2957]

@masjta I used to think the same thing until a tornado hit our town. My "fourty nine dollar texting facetime video phone" did not work, nor did the land line phones. All the hams were still talking with virtually no interruption.

[CCWSig]

@videovaultault I'll also add that emergency responders, their radios and equipment rely on a huge infrastructure to be able to communicate. Very few departments are simplex anymore. In a medium to severe emergency, whether it be man made, or mother nature provided can easily wipe out this infrastructure making their system useless. Ham radio specializes in simplex communication with next to no resources.

[smjjasdfa]

@videovaultault

Amateur radio operators ARE licensed by the federal government (ever hear of the FCC?), ARE trained and ARE authorized by the federal government to operate under emergency conditions. You'd be amazed at the equipment and skill of these "amateurs" LOL

Field Day is an annual readiness exercise designed to test the capabilities of amateur radio ops to send and receive under suboptimal conditions. They operate under very strict guidelines and under the watchful eye of the FCC.

[troy12n]

Who is the reporter? She must not be from Charleston, lol.

[solobackpacking]

I can see her nipples.

[teamfab]

CB radio is far far better..........

[VictoreCelia]

cool