 Do you have a daughter named Nicole? She's here with me and she is warm and safe this afternoon thanks to Amron. Roger, I'll let you say hi to her. Hi Dad. Radio free readout begins in five, four, three, two. Our world is changing right before our eyes. This didn't happen overnight. It crept in on a culture that was asleep at best. Most were apathetic though, distracted and entertained. This nation destroying machine that is grinding Americanism to a pulp was conceived of long ago. There are forces that have been planning the assassination of everything the United States once stood for and they are in the final stages of planning and they are ready to pull the trigger. It started out gradually but it's picking up momentum. At some point in our not too distant future something's going to break. When it does, do you have a plan? Are you prepared to provide for your family, protect your community and quickly rebuild? More Americans are waking up every day and they're preparing. The growth in numbers of our fellow citizens who are becoming aware is exponential. Citizens who are preparing, informing others, striving towards self-reliance and want to preserve their rich American Judeo-Christian heritage and their values after a social, economic or political collapse. They're preparing and developing skills at an ever increasing pace. Food storage and food production, water procurement, shelter, medical, combatives, tactics and defensive planning, land navigation, bug out bags, retreat building, strategic relocation and the list goes on. But there's one component in preparedness planning that is probably the most overlooked of all communications. I'm John Jacob Schmidt from Radio Free Redoubt. We're going to introduce you to the world of communications for those of you who aren't very familiar with it. If you do have some type of communications plan for yourself, your family or your group, we're going to show you ways to increase your capabilities and your effectiveness. We're going to introduce you to communications from the perspectives of preppers, patriots, redouters and partisans. First, ask yourself this question. If it all went down tomorrow, how would you stay informed? How would you stay connected? How would you pass information to others? How would you contribute to your family, your group and your community? Don't answer yet. Just sit back and watch. This is John Jacob Schmidt. Out. I'm sure you guys know things have gotten pretty bad. A lot of our friends are relocating to their retreats. In fact, a lot of them left two or three weeks ago. My wife and kids have already relocated. I know they're safe because I was able to keep track with them using the Amron net. More about that in a little bit. I stayed behind to get some things taken care of. And tonight I'm going to head out. I got everything packed, including my power supply for radios. I've got my comms bag with me and I also have my comms plan with all the frequencies I need for my trip. Well, I'm about two hours out from my final destination. I've been driving all night. The sun is coming up right now, which is a welcome sight. Amron operators. Amron, the American Readout Radio Operators Network and the Channel 3 Project, they have been so supportive and they've been passing messages to my family, letting them know I'm in route and that I'm safe. Amron members are generally in two different categories. They are either hams or they are non-ham relays. Now of course, ham operators are expected to act as relays. They are the link between the ham world, the licensed amateur radio operators, and the non-ham world. And as a ham operator receives information over the ham radio frequencies, he will turn right around and relay that information at designated times on designated channels over the CH3 channels, keeping the non-hams informed so everyone is in the loop as far as information and intelligence. Now there are non-ham Amron operators. They aren't licensed, but what they do is they monitor either on a ham radio that they don't talk on, but of course in a real world emergency, you can talk on ham radio without a license if there's a life-threatening situation. But someone who is not licensed, they might monitor on their police scanner where they can listen to the local ham radio traffic and then of course they will also monitor sometimes the HF or shortwave radio with single sideband capability. So they are not licensed hams, but they are monitoring and receiving information and then relaying that back out on CB or FRS or MRRS and some of them multiple types of radios. Also the relay and the ham, it can work both ways. So they might receive information from their local area on CB radio and that relay will turn back around and relay that information to the ham operator who can then send that information and that intelligence out across the network to other communities and even other states. It's about time. What am I going to do, dad? Radio batteries. I think I get it. Read outer X-ray. This is read outer November papa. Can you hear me? Stranded. I've been out here for hours. I'm miles away from home. I don't know what to do. My car is broken down. I don't know what's wrong with it. I don't know what's going to happen. I'm cold. I don't know what to do. I hope so. I think so. Can you tell me where you are? You must be fairly close. Highway 57. Oh well you're not probably 10 minutes from us. Why don't I come and get you and Ma to make you some hot soup while we figure out something to see if we can contact home. Okay. Thank you so much. Roger, we'll be there in just a few minutes. November papa, this is Hotel 77. Yes, Hotel 77 right behind you. Thank you so much. Come on in. You must be freezing. Come on in. Thank you guys so much. The Amron operators that that are ham operators that participate in the regularly scheduled nets understand that there's a trade-off to practicing communications in peacetime. But practicing now is critical because if you do not practice your with your equipment now, become familiar with that, work out the bugs like some folks who only plan on purchasing the equipment, then hiding it away. Then when some sort of event happens, they plan on pulling it out and plugging it in and talking on it. And they just simply will not be able to communicate with anyone else. They don't realize how naive they are as experienced ham operators can attest. There is quite a process to becoming familiar with your equipment and bugs and things that you didn't anticipate, cables that you didn't realize that you needed. There are special tones and codes to to look up that you need to download and access on the internet so you can incorporate that into your radio programming so it will work. Now of course during these regularly scheduled nets, they use their FCC call signs during peacetime on ham radio. Never want to use your Amron or your ARN codename over ham radio. And likewise, you never want to use your FCC call sign over any of the CH3 channels or the non ham communications. My dad always was into the radios and he's got so many stuff downstairs. I don't know what's what and he always taught me about it and thank goodness he sends me with a radio. Otherwise I don't know what I would have done out there. Well that's that's great. He's really thinking ahead. Do you know what his call sign is? We might be able to call him on on HF. I don't know what HF is but I know he has all the instructions on the paper he gave me in my past. Did uh did he uh let's see what he put down there maybe we can we can contact him. That'd be awesome. The Amron membership or the American Readout Network membership is a listing of both hams and non hams. People that describe themselves as as redouters joined the ARN and they're on a directory. It's it's anonymous. It's free and it has a directory so that you can see other like-minded people living in your vicinity. Right at the beginning of the year in 2014 Tapper merged with Amron and Amron originally designed to be a American readout communications network has since gone nationwide and Tapper which is the American Prepper radio network they handled a lot of Prepper communications between Preppers and Patriots along mostly the the east coast and the south and so we had a meeting in the middle we called Operation Golden Spike and that's where Amron mostly in the western United States began linking with the primarily east coast preparedness network to join one network of like-minded communicators that became the Amron and Tapper merger and of course has since become just simply Amron. Amron Whiskey 7 QRZ Amron Whiskey 7 QRZ this is Amron Operator Hotel 77 Amron Operator Whiskey 7 QRZ Whiskey 7 QRZ this is Amron Operator Hotel 77 I read you loud and clear do you have a daughter named Nicole she's here with me and she is warm and safe this afternoon thanks to Amron. Roger I'll let you say hi to her hi dad yes I'm safe it's okay okay Amron Whiskey 7 QRZ this is Hotel 77 yes she's fine and she's able to stay with us for as long as you like I think we're about 150 miles from you roughly and we can make arrangements to get her home in the future but she's welcome to stay here as long as she'd like over. Yeah we'll break it down of course this is just an overview but it's a pretty good overview there are several components to the communications plan there's CH3 or Channel 3 project there's Amron, Tapper and Radio Free Redoubt rebroadcasting stations. All of it falls under the umbrella of Amron the American Redoubt Radio Operators Network. In a real-world emergency ham operators typically have the corner on the market for intel for information being passed back and forth that leaves historically non-hams out of the loop unless they've gone through the trouble of and built monitoring ham traffic into their commo plans using scanners and shortwave radios then that the shortwave radios need to be single sideband capable. So Amron and CH3 the CH3 program is designed to connect hams with non-hams using ham operators and non-hams acting as relays. So information flows both ways so that non-ham operators can actually be part of the process and send information up the chain to ham operators who can then disseminate it widely. This was originally designed as a network to keep the American Redoubt connected in a down situation between groups and even communities. But since then it's gone nationwide with pre-scheduled practice nets taking place across the country on a regular basis. Now keep in mind this is a standardized communications plan for communications among like-minded people, patriots, preppers, redoubters, etc. Or at least it greatly increases the odds that the person you're talking to is more than likely friendly. It's part of the weeding out process to help better your chances of avoiding the hostiles and predators in a down situation. Each group should have their own internal communications plans separate from Amron including cell phones, texting, military field radios, ham radio, GMRS, commercial UHF, VHF radios, the skies the limit. But to have a standardized communications plan is really critical on a broader level. When it first started there were checkpoints and house-to-house raids, military style, but it wasn't the military or the police. They were taking people to the relief centers. I was hearing reports from all over on my CB, FRS and ham radio. I knew I needed to get the word out. I started typing up spot reports on my laptop. I knew I needed to be ready for the next scheduled transmission time. We had those planned out before all this started. The first thing we developed back in 2011 was called the CH3 project. Everyone has an FRS radio it seems and some people have MERS radios and a lot of people have CB radios. They're simple to use. They're inexpensive. They don't require a license. They're readily available at pretty much any sporting goods store, truck stops, box stores, radio shack, wherever. And just about everyone has an FRS radio the family radio service. Now, it is misleading the range that some of the packaging claims 15, 20, 25, 30 mile range. It's just not the case. But they're great for short-range communications like vehicle to vehicle or patrolling on your property or when you just need communications up to just a mile or two away in most terrain. Well, this began from a proper network in the American Readout who agreed to develop a commo plan to link up with for mutual support while they are bugging out and traveling. Now, there are national emergency channels on the CB radio, Citizens Band radio. Channel 9 is the nationally designated emergency hailing channel. Channel 9 on CB. FRS is channel one, but channel one is also the recommended hailing distress frequency used by CERT, the civilian emergency response teams that work very closely with the Department of Homeland Security. Then of course, MERS radios, the multi-use radio service does not have a nationally designated emergency frequency and Marine VHF is channel 16. They're really all over the place. Now, in this preparedness network several years ago, some of them agreed that we'll all meet on channel three on our FRS radios. Well, several people said we only have a CB radio, while a couple of members had both FRS and CB radios. Some of them had the MERS radios because they were using the Dakota Alert motion sensors that come with the transceiver that's already has the MERS channels built into it. The general agreement, the consensus was we'll all just remember, so we can all just remember one thing, channel three. And so it became a standard among a prepper network that actually was folded into the what would become AMRON. There were two or three AMRON operators picking up my spot reports. They'd send it back out and it was spreading like wildfire, mostly on the channel three frequencies. I had been an AMRON operator before all this started. A friend of a friend had introduced me. We had these set up, predetermined, transmit times ready in case something like this happened. One of the first things that was developed was a standardized plan to be able to use the radios on predesignated channels at predesignated times. And in a way that is mindful of power conservation with the stored power in the batteries, making those last longer. So we came up with the CH3 program, three, two, one. So you turn it to channel three, attempt to make contact for two minutes every one hour at the top of the hour. Three, two, one channel three, transmit for two minutes and you do that every one hour on the hour. One of the things that's con that's concerning is contacting someone who you don't know. And when you need to contact and reach out for help, but you want to try to minimize contact with hostile elements, you obviously, whenever you can, want to try to get a hold of somebody that's like minded. And how do you do that? Or how do you at least increase the odds of that? So we developed a protocol for contacting unknown parties. At any other time, when you make a radio call, you would use either your ARN, your American Readout Network code name or call sign, or your Amron code name. And you would use that code name or that call sign as your call sign when you are operating on the CH3 frequencies. But if you need to contact someone that you don't know, but you need help, you are in distress and you need to call for help and you want to try to do everything you can to make sure that this is going to be a friendly, then you always precede the call signs or yourself and the party that you're trying to make contact with with the word redouter. And of course, redouting or redoubt is, or redoubt is a safe haven, refuge, protected place and defensible position. So this is where the term redoubt came from. Redouter xray. xray is always the unknown variable. If you're trying to reach a party that you do not know and you're calling for anyone who will answer and anyone who will listen, you just automatically assign that unknown party xray until you find out that they have a different call sign. The ham operators are familiar with this, the term CQ. CQ, CQ, CQ might be a typical way to call out on the radio when you are just asking for anybody who might be listening. But the CH3 project, it's much the same except we use the term or the call sign xray for the unknown party. Always want to precede your call sign and their call sign with redouter, especially in your initial communication link up. So you would call out redouter xray, this is redouter, use your code name for John Schmidt, it might be Juliet Sierra. If your name is Jim Andrews, you would use this is redouter Juliet alpha. I was worried I could get caught. I tried moving around so I wouldn't get pinpointed. I'd often transmit as I was driving down the highway. I knew where most of the checkpoints were with all the communications that had come in. If I did find myself in a checkpoint, I had a plan. I was going to tell them that the laptop and the radio were part of my husband's work as a contractor. And if I had time before I got up to the checkpoint, I was going to drop the battery down in between the seats, just to be on the safe side. And I did have a password protected. One very valid question that people ask sometimes is, you know, can these be intercepted? Can they be jammed? Can they be disrupted? The AMRON, the ham communications, CBs, FRS? Yes, they can. But don't not have a plan just because they might get intercepted or they could be jammed or they could be disrupted. That's not a reason to throw out having any kind of a communications plan at all. You have a plan and then if you experience disruptions, you adjust to that. But don't use it as an excuse not to have a plan at all. There are many different scenarios where this could be useful to save lives or some people might not incorporate that into their overall communications and prepping because it could be intercepted or could be jammed, much like the EMP argument. Was I worried about the bad guys picking up my spot reports? Well, I mean, what's worse, the bad guys hearing a few reports of the things that they're doing or people being blindsided. I knew that lives could depend on these reports and I had to continue transmitting them. I just think it's really important that people understand the necessity for planning now, training with the equipment now, building the network now and becoming proficient in that so that when it counts, we're not fumbling and stumbling. The information can begin flowing immediately and that will be really important right up on the front end. The initial onset of some triggering event, the quicker that we can get likeminded people in communication with each other, the quicker that we can restore some level of normalcy. And one of the things that troubles me about the prepper community is that they often plan for the event and that's as far as their mind will allow them to plan. There will be a rebuilding, there will be an afterword. Well, you know, we've been studying this stuff and prepping and doing all these things for a long time, but you know, when it went down, it still kind of takes you by surprise. And so we kept thinking, you know, maybe we should, we should bug out now and because you know, it's like less than an hour to our retreat property. So after a couple days, you say, okay, let's go. So we packed up and and then just before we left, I started thinking, well, we don't really know what's out there, what's been going on. So what we did was we got into our, you can see your piece of equipment here. And prior to this going down, we had got in on what's called AMRON and AMRON nets and so forth was a communication set up, you know, for emergencies. So just before we left, we went ahead and we fired up our little computer here and it's just to see if there's something wrong with wow, you know, the blood just about drained out of my, my whole head because there it was sitting right there text out and said that people have been stopping at this roadblock about five miles on our main route. And and I just sat there staring at it for five minutes and and then I started saying, wait a minute, I have an alternate plan. And so without the AMRON deal, we would have driven right into that roadblock. And so anyway, here we were and we're sneaking on these back roads. It probably took us about four or five hours to get to our retreat because we had to take all these little side roads and practically deer trails and everything. But we had a good little rig to do it with. And fortunately, that was running good. But at one point, we got up. There was another roadblock that we hadn't even known about. And we would start watching it with a pair of binoculars and they had some guys who look like guardsmen, but we really weren't quite sure. And then people would come along and they'd flag them over there and they talked to them for a few minutes. And next thing you know, they'd take their bags from them and they had them on the ground and they zip tied their hand behind their back and then they they didn't really hurt them, but they were handling them pretty rough. And then they went through their bags and any weapons and stuff, they had a little trailer behind that. They had a couple of trucks there, these guardsmen and they started they put all their weapons in there. They didn't just throw them in, they stacked them in there. And next thing you know, it looked like they had a full truck. We must have watched them for about 45 minutes. And then the truck looked like it was loaded. Another truck showed up and an empty truck and the one that had the people in it, they took off. They went, some we don't know where they went, we hope, hope, you know, and prayed that, you know, they're going to be all right. And then we continued on our way and we got to one point and there seemed to be more houses around and we ran into this group of people and they had a roadblock set up and we thought, wow, this is it because we had just come around a curb and we just drove right into them and, you know, almost on top of them, there's no way to back out. And then I looked at my rear of the mirror and there was a couple of guys walked out on the road and they had weapons similar to this one here. And I thought, boy, this is the end of the line for us. And it turned out there are patriot type people we talked to them. And over a few minutes we mentioned to them about Amron and they said they were familiar with it. And that's one of the reasons why they were watching their own road and their own community. And they asked us, we needed anything? We said, no, we just need to get where we're going. And they said, okay. And they let us get through. And so, but without the Amron deal, we would have been in that roadblock and we would have been in a world that hurt. Amron saved our life, definitely. Digital, what's called digital communications in the radio world is something that's very widely used. And this is very similar to your cell phone, for example, and texting. Because being able to send text messages over radio, whether you use CW, which is Morse code, or some other type of phase shift keying or radio teletype, basically, all those are different ways of sending words, text, over radio. And so, when you are sitting on a mountaintop, a long ways away from the nearest cell phone tower, and you have your cell phone there, you may be down to one bar, sometimes the bar disappears, and then you all of a sudden you have one bar again, you can't make a phone call. It keeps saying call lost. The string, the signal, the bandwidth of a voice communication over the airwaves is very wide and it requires a lot of power to drive that signal. But you can type up a text message, hit send, and it goes right through. It's because the digital side uses very narrow bandwidth and it requires very little power to push it way farther than it does voice. And so the Amron operators, the radio operators are using a lot of digital communications when you have weak or poor band conditions, or when you have to send information a longer distance. These are basically a way using a small laptop to send text messages connected to your radio in just quick bursts. And so it also can be very helpful in eliminating your signal, your footprint, more difficult to use radio direction finding technology to pinpoint your location. It just helps. On top of that, if you send a voice message across the radio, everybody and anybody can hear what you're saying, that you're going to meet the Joneses at such and such an intersection such and such a time. But if you send that message digitally, you have to have specialized equipment to be able to intercept and understand that. Again, it's another layer in the security process for secure communications. It doesn't make it completely secure because there are government entities. And then of course, there are other ham operators or experienced communicators could also receive this. But typical Joe Dirtbag, he's not going to have digital communications capabilities. After we left the private roadblock of that community, we found ourselves a spot and we called in and we alerted the hammer on net and let them know about this other roadblock that we hadn't been aware of. It was just our good luck that we happened to come to a open spot on that upper road and saw what was going on. So one of the things that's so important in a down situation is to make sure the information is accurate, that it is timely so that the right people can make the most use of it. And so we developed spot reports and these spot reports are an amalgamation of a couple of different types of if you see some type of information that could be useful, how to report that. This helps avoid all of the vague reports that could come in saying, yeah, I saw an MRAP driving down the road. And that's the whole report. So this is a format, you can print it out. And it's a guide to help you report information, the who, what, where, when, why, how, how many, you know, who did you, who are you? What did you see? Where did you see this? What was the direction of travel? What time did this take place? How many individuals were involved? How many vehicles were there? What was the time and date of this? Is this still, is this fresh information or is it old? What was the disposition of this? Did they drive away? Did they interact with you? Did you get documentation? Did you take photographs? Did you draw a sketch? Did you write down a bumper number or license plates or a badge number or a name of someone that you overheard? So as much information as you can get, the better. And the spot reports are used by ham operators and relays. And just all the eyes and ears of the Patriot and Prepper and Redouter community to help with that information, disseminating that information. Once we got to our retreat, what we started, what we did is we set up our own equipment. And because we didn't know exactly what was going on, and after seeing that there was actually some sort of organized, possibly military, we didn't want to be, have a locator spot us. So what we did is we set up portable units. And what we would do is we'd go a few miles away from our permanent location, send our messages out, and then get back where we would go back to our own place. And as soon as we sent our message, we zipped it out, then we would, we'll get back to our own place and get out of that area. One common argument that we hear from people, typically ones who will not increase their communications capabilities, is the EMP argument, the EMP scapegoat. And they say, well, you know, the people with your communications and all the stuff, what if there's an EMP? Oh, you got a laptop, huh? You're going to use a laptop for digital communications. What if there's an EMP? Huh? Well, there's ways to mitigate damage from an EMP. But there's a thousand and one other things that can happen in this country besides EMP. Don't use, there could be an EMP as an excuse not to do anything or have any other type of communications capabilities beyond your FRS radio or your CB radio. That's kind of an emotional thing for me. We've been through so much during these hard times. But first of all, I need to lay a little history on you. Years ago, years ago, my husband got involved in him radio. And that was when our boys were very little. And all of us, especially when cell phones became prevalent, it's like, ah, what's with this hobby? You know, we'd be having family time and he's answering on his radio and it's like rolling the ice and everything. And now, now looking back, it had to have been a God thing. It's just amazing how things have unfolded. And it was just meant to be, let my husband tell you what happened when it first started. Yeah, I remember we were sitting in our living room reading and all of a sudden we got a call on the radio from a young girl that was in distress. She was broke down by the side of the road and she was calling on her radio and we got the call and I was able to go out and pick her up on the side of the road and bring her home. She ended up staying with us for quite some time. We ended up being able to contact her father who was also a ham radio operator and thank goodness that he had the insight to provide a go bag and instructions and everything on how to use her radio. And she called and I picked up the call and went and picked her up on the side of the road. We brought her home and she stayed with us for about a month during the difficult times. It was actually longer. It was actually longer than that and it turned out to be such a good thing because it wasn't us helping her out. She gave so much in return and we just become so close to her and I know it's going to be a lifelong relationship. We think of her as Ben. Yeah thank goodness for Amron and the efforts that have gone into promoting Amron and Channel 3 program. We were able to make contact with her parents and get her home through the use of Amateur Radio and the Channel 3 project. We've developed a relationship. We talked to her parents and that quite often now and hopefully we'll see more of Nicole. And this is only one story. I mean there have been so many others but you always remember first with clarity. I don't know where we'd be without communication. Communications are so important. Well it was a god thing that somebody was able to hear her call for distress because she was on a very desolate portion of the highway. It was snowing. The weather was terribly cold and you know had nobody heard her it could have been days before anybody discovered her. As it was she was just on the side of the road for a short while before somebody was able to come to her rescue. And the thing is you know every day turn on his radio and every day silence, silence. But had he not taken the time to turn that on what could happen you know. So you can't say uh you know it's not important it is important because you you know that little um you know action of just turning on the radio and being there it made all the difference. Yeah looking back it was uh it was a god thing. It was a god thing. We really believe that and um you know it's it's comforting to be able to feel like you can do some good. The AMRAWM network is nationwide and from what I understand they have nets nationwide and they're trying to promote the channel three project or had been trying to promote channel three prior to this event. So thank god for foresight. Yeah thank god for foresight. You know I I have been in the AMRAWM radio for a long time so I have gotten involved in the AMRAWM program and um downloaded the band plan for a scenario and uh we get on the radio twice a day and then monitor some of the other local channels uh uh at different times during the day FRS, MURS, CP which uh you know we want to be able to contribute to anybody locally that may be in distress so but had it not been for the AMRAWM band plan that told me what times to get on the radio um I probably wouldn't have ever found out about it wouldn't have known about Nicole being stranded out there with Mr. Cole. And thank god that her dad was on board. You know most girls in a situation like that they wouldn't have had the go back and with her dad I know how young kids uh kids are especially girls it's like oh dad you know I'm I'm growing up now I can take care of myself but um no matter how growing up you are you better be prepared. I'm sure she felt very much alone on the side of the road and uh when she heard a helpful voice come over the radio she was relieved. Well she shared that moment with us remember and she and how frightened she was and and it's like and she said she went to her trunk and there there was that backpack and she said that she went back in the car and she's looking through it and there's food and there's a gun a loaded gun and and she she thought dad you know thank god you know and then she found the radio and and she remembered although she didn't pay that much attention it was part of her life and and even though you're not really paying attention you you kind of soaked that up and um she knew what to do she knew what to do so many people if I only would have known if I only would have known we've seen it coming for years for years and the time to prepare is after it's happened you know I wish people would have opened their eyes I wish people would have taken it seriously and they could have saved so much grief there's another small program that is going to be developed in 2014 and expanded upon and we want to fully develop the rebroadcasting station program and we call these radio free readout rebroadcasting stations there are commercially available fm and am transmitters that transmit in the commercial am and fm bands this is similar to a home that you would see for sale with the sign that says tune in to 91.5 to hear more about this house and you're sitting there in your car on your fm dial and you turn it turn it to 91.5 and then you're here in the realtor on a pre-recorded message saying how many rooms there are in this home and this is the square footage and as you drive away you get about a block down the road and it starts getting scratchy and you get two or three blocks you can kind of still make it out and then pretty soon it fades away and he's gone these are very low power 500 milliwatt half a watt fm transmitters that transmit on the commercial bands as i said there's commercial commercially available transmitters that have adjustable power settings on those and we have rebroadcast stations across the country on am and fm and they will rebroadcast radio free readout once a week and we've had several actually that have gone beyond that and they will download previous podcasts and they'll have other audio files and things like that that they can broadcast throughout their neighborhoods or their communities and then of course during peacetime they're doing this on a regular basis it's a lot of fun it's like having your own small little listening audience in your neighborhood and they actually have people tuning in and listening regularly now in a real world grid down situation the commercial radio stations within just days or weeks at best they're going to start disappearing leaving most of the people in an information blackout during peacetime legal limit for fm broadcasting with these little transmitters is 500 milliwatts that's a half a watt but you purchase an adjustable wattage for a real situation that you can adjust up to 15 20 30 or 50 or 80 watts then you have downloaded podcasts music the value of that to your community has is a very profound psychological aspect to it because it helps instill in them a sense of community being connected to the outside world it adds a great deal of comfort and this can be used in a collapse or post-collapse or rebuilding area of communications they can rebroadcast amron radio traffic they many of them have a headset input so you can also put out public announcements and information to help your community stay informed and we'd love to have our rebroadcast stations email us in so that we can expand the directory of broadcasting rebroadcasting stations of course if there's commercial radio stations dropping off people are going to be searching the dial for any type of voice any sense of comfort they can get from the radio and so it won't be hard to find you if the the commercial stations are dropping off so what you can do is you can let them know what town or frequency that you're in if you are on our directory they can begin tuning in pre-collapse and then they know right where to go on the dial post-collapse i'm an everyday average person i'm a single mom it was very concerned because i saw things coming down the pipeline i saw things coming things that added up to trouble for me especially being a single mother knowing that uh i was responsible for not only myself but for my daughter and everything fell on my shoulders and through several resources um not mainstream media because they weren't telling people the truth there were things that that got to me i would think of scenarios that could possibly happen and i know that we cannot possibly prepare for everything but um i knew that i needed to take action and and what i could and the lord would help me with the rest i i became a prepper i started doing the little things that i could and one of those things was i started talking to my neighbors another component to that was i bought a shortwave radio with single sideband and i started listening to ham operators specifically amron operators passing information back and forth and that was very helpful to me um maybe not so much on on all the issues but it was a comfort knowing that there was a network of people out there that would be there in an emergency situation there was one particular source that truly encouraged and inspired me as a radio-free readout and it was a podcast that um i just instantly became a big fan of of theirs they really helped me to put things into perspective and to um it made me realize that even though i am an everyday average person that it gave me the uh the inspiration to stand up and fight the good fight one thing in specific is radio free readout had a rebroadcast program um on a volunteer basis and i thought that's something i could do i've i could do that so i bought an fm transmitter online and um i put it to use i i would plug that fm transmitter with an audio jack into my computer's headphone jack and i would rebroadcast radio free readout through my neighborhood i had some like-minded neighbors and people actually listened to it on the fm dial and they've really liked it they appreciated i got really good feedback and um it seemed to just give us a sense of togetherness like we were in this together it was my neighbors that would you know that were listening but what was even greater than that is it had the ripple effect it you know people talk to other people and encourage each other especially like-minded people and it got more people listening to radio free readout so it was uh it was effective in just spreading the word this was before anything you know before the world changed as we as we knew it it almost felt like i had my own little radio station the amron operators network before the collapse happened uh they would do practice nets about twice a month and when everything happened they actually went to about four times daily for about two hours every every five hours or so um they would have nets going on and um sometimes before ave an amron operators net i would rebroadcast a radio free readout podcast before in our world we had a lot of noise there was always some kind of noise going on and the silence drove me nuts it was uh just the comfort of a voice of of music of um re re re establishing normalcy the one thing that i really want to stress upon people is the importance to be able to have a communications plan now before everything goes down so that they can become proficient so that they can begin networking now so that on the day when it really matters when this triggering event occurs the quicker we can have people connected and communicating with each other the quicker we'll be able to begin developing some level of normalcy restabilizing the situation and then rebuilding one of the biggest challenges in the prepper community is to get the individual to not just plan for the event because that's typically what happens the prepper plans for the triggering event the collapse and that's as far as their minds allow them to prepare there will be a rebuilding afterward there will be a reemergence of some type of society or several smaller societies and the advantage is going to go to those who can quickly organize and communicate with one another afterward and to be able to do that we've got to be able to communicate before him uh uh it was neat that i was able to play a part in keeping people informed just by re transmitting and or transmitting and rebroadcasting uh commercial FM stations were going down one by one i powered everything with a an RV battery with a solar panel um and and here's the the main point to to all of this uh not everyone has a shortwave radio like i did i was thankful that i was given the foresight to purchase something like that and have that on hand when everything did go down but the great thing is is everybody has an FM radio and i was able to uh transmit over the air for the people that didn't have a shortwave radio people received information that wouldn't have otherwise i consider myself a prepper more accurately a prepared patriot and i have for many years and over that time i've seen a lot of people join the preparedness community and there's one thing i've noticed that's almost always present in every prepper group or individual and that's the lack of balance either their weapons centric and place most of their emphasis on the tactical side of preparedness or they have seven years of food but no way of procuring or treating water or their defenses are grossly inadequate the communications portion is normally the most neglected area in most individual and group preparations and especially at the community level of those who are the most squared away in their communications capabilities they're the ones that are often so immersed in their endeavor to communicate with anyone and everyone they neglect other essential areas such as security or the ability to produce long-term food supply most serious communicators though such as ham radio operators or more formally amateur radio operators are inherently emergency and disaster minded as the motto of the arl goes when all else fails there's ham radio so it's easy enough to talk the typical ham operator into expanding his or her preps into other areas such as food and water they get it here we need to focus on the prepper whose communications capabilities aren't up to speed well now it's been several years now but oddly enough i remember it like it was yesterday i was out of town on business in the front chaff and while monitoring channel nine and nineteen on my cv radio i could hear the chatter and reliance from the sprees roving bands and robbers people that weren't prepared for the claps until we're looking to take from those four by force i was about two days from home and i knew it wasn't safe to be out on the road particularly since i was alone but uh fortunately i followed the radio free readout website frequently and i had seen the article on uh ch3 or channel three communications they uh a link up protocol used by uh individuals and disaster preparedness retreat groups you know i was supposed to be used in case of a real world emergency when normal communications are unavailable so i had uh familiarized myself with the procedure months and months before anyway i switched over to channel three and i keyed my mic so the readout or x-ray this is readout echo charlie does anyone talk to nothing so again i keyed up readout x-ray this is readout echo charlie is there anyone out there and uh and that's when i heard it there was a voice that boomed through the speakers my little hope that cb readout echo charlie this is readout tango sierra boy i had never been so relieved it just so happened that a fellow readouter was monitoring the station and uh after explaining my situation to him he immediately offered his assistance it turned out he lived just a few miles away and after giving him a general idea as to where i was he met me in his truck and allowed me to follow him back to his place he was understandably uh a little eerie well hesitant to invite me into his home in fact he shared with me that had i not mentioned the word readouter in my distress call that he would not have responded to me in any case he told me that i was welcome to take refuge in a shop and stay as long as i needed uh a few days later this gentleman also made contact with a caravan and they were headed in the same general direction that i was going and we were able to rendezvous and uh with the help of these individuals i was finally able to safely make it home i had it not been through the ch3 project and and more importantly people that took it upon themselves to implement it god only knows where i beat today everyone's on a budget and everyone has to try to prioritize their preparations if you can't get completely up to speed where you would like to be for communications if nothing else have the ability to receive voice communications you can do this by using a scanner that will pick up your vhf and uhf frequencies they will pick up your frs mers marine radio gmrs noa a weather alert police fire ems commercial bands plus your local ham 2 meter and 70 centimeter ham bands you can get those very uh inexpensively at a pawn shop at a garage sale keep your eye open and that's going to allow you to pick up local communications for having the ability to also transmit you can pick up an inexpensive handheld ham radio that's also capable of picking up everything that a scanner can however in an emergency you could also transmit on it so there you have in your hand not just a scanner which is a great tool but something that can communicate two ways now you can transmit on that frs and that mers and that 2 meter and 70 centimeter handband to receive information coming from long distance hf also shortwave you really need to have a radio with single sideband because that is the mode that the ham operators are going to be using they will be transmitting on single sideband because it allows their signal to go farther with less power so with a shortwave radio especially if it has single sideband capability you'll be able to hear the hf ham traffic plus commercial shortwave broadcasts coming from across the country and around the world even well i was driving home from visiting my parents are on my way back to college and you know i was about 200 miles out and my car broke down i didn't know what was going on i didn't know what was wrong with it you know i popped the hood pretend like i knew what i was doing but i had no idea what was going on and all of a sudden i just i was frustrated i was about ready to cry i was cold i'd been sitting there for two hours not knowing what to do and suddenly i remembered my dad had everything in there with me my phone wasn't working but you know so i went and i realized i had that pack he nailed nailed it in my head every time i went somewhere to be prepared for anything and you know i just can't believe i sat there for two hours and didn't even think about it so i finally got the pack and he had everything i needed directions um for everything that was in there an mre food gun for my safety and a radio to contact somebody to help me and that that saved my life and my dad nailed it into my head everything i needed to do but i mean it went it went right over my head i was invincible i was 19 20 years old nothing was going to happen to me i was fine i was happy i had my own life going on my own social life my friends the world wasn't going to end in my mind we went through multiple family meetings where we sat around the guns how to clean them how to shoot them how to take care of them also with the radios he taught us how to communicate and you know i sat there and was respectful and listened but it was always this thing so i never really paid attention as much as i should have um like i said before my dad you know taught me about the radios he had him he had all sorts of different radios i didn't know what was what but um in the pack he set up for me with typed out directions on how to use a call sign and if you don't have a specified call sign you just use your initials like mine would have been you know nicole preasy i used november papa when i on that day which you know like i said earlier had taken my life so he had typed out on directions on what to say who to contact and what kind of like what the like minded people would be saying so i knew who i was talking to was a friend i think a lot has changed i think that my mindset is different um i realized that i'm not invincible and with everything going on in the world you know i have to be prepared for that kind of stuff and bad things happened everybody not just the people who aren't prepared but the people who are prepared and if i wasn't i could have been dead on the side of the road who knows what could have happened to me you know if i had happened to break down 200 miles further who knows who would have answered the radio call sign and um i probably wouldn't even trusted them to tell them where i were so i could have been stranded there even longer or who knows what could happen to me but with the way i was raised i think that my dad fully prepared me on how to defend myself with a weapon safely and properly i think with our radio system i could have picked up any stranger with a radio but with the amron system that was invented for like minded people to be able to talk to each other with that kind of system you're talking to like minded people friends family like i heard from someone i was talking to earlier an amron operator is a friend you've never met being able to talk to my dad over a radio kind of really gave me a security blanket it made me feel comfortable because essentially these people that i am living with i don't know them very well i mean i got to know them thank goodness and they kept me safe and they gave me food to eat and shelter and they they took very good care of me until i was able to reunite with my family but being able to talk to my dad it made me feel connected to my family even though i was miles away from them if america can't be restored it can at least be restored in certain areas that's why this readout was created was um for like minded people to live up here and you know get back to the roots of our country and at least get it started here with everything that's happened i'm angry that's the best word that can describe how i feel i'm angry at the people who chose to put certain people in charge of this country and i'm more angry at those people as of what they've done to our country just a couple i mean it seems like so long ago but just a few hundred years ago this country was perfect it was free it was under the nation of god and it was it was everyone wanted to live here and now i you know it's hard to see a future for myself the one i wanted just five years ago i never would have seen myself here my future is gone and i'm angry and i'm i want to i want to see this country restored i want to see it change and i'm willing to die for that and that's so this never happens again well folks can learn more about the ch3 amron tavern and radio free readout broadcasting station program um nets uh how to join a net that's already ongoing in your area and if there isn't one how to start one we have information over there radio free readout dot com and amron dot com that has the net scripts messaging formats spot reports and a lot more this is also available in a downloadable communications soi which is signal operating instruct signals operating instructions over also at radio free readout dot com and amron dot com and that's downloadable for only a dollar 99 it's a great thing to have printed out and it brings everything together in one nice neat little package this is john jacob schmitt out