Greetings to all Amateur Radio Operators. This is Marc, N4UFP with the
January 2015 South Carolina Section Manager’s Report. Please
remember that the SC Section website can be found at: www.arrlsc.org/
where my full SM report will be listed as well as up-to-the-date
information on Amateur Radio in South Carolina.
You should receive this report Friday afternoon and I want to remind
you about the SC QSO Party, which will take place tomorrow from 9:00 am
to 8:00pm local time. The rules can be found at scqso.com. The SC QSO
party will be one-half of the Carolina QSO party weekend, the other
half being the NC QSO Party, which occurs this Sunday from 10 am to 8
pm. More information on this event can be found at
http://www.rars.org/ncqsoparty/
/> This year’s SC QSO Party contains a “contest within a contest”
The organizers have added the “HUNLEY CHALLENGE” Award, created to
commemorate the mission of the H.L. Hunley submarine against the
Federal blockade ship USS Housatonic off the coast of Charleston, SC on
February 27, 1864.
Objective: Awarded to stations spelling “HUNLEY” during the 2016
South Carolina QSO Party by contacting at least ONE amateur radio
operator located in counties which begin with these letters.
Qualifying counties:
H – Hampton Horry
U – Union
N – Newberry
L – Lancaster Laurens Lee Lexington
E – Edgefield
Y – York
Those who complete this challenge will receive a commemorative
certificate via email.
The following information on the statewide communications exercise
comes from Roger Mull, KD4JQJ
ARES/RACES District Emergency Coordinator for the South Carolina
Emergency Operations Center
kd4jqj@arrl.net
From 8:00 AM until 5:00 PM starting Monday March 14 and concluding on
Tuesday March 15, the state will be conducting its annual full scale
exercise involving communications. This year exercise centers on an
earthquake with an epicenter near Summerville. ARES, RACES and
AUXCOMM members are highly encouraged to check into nets, conducted
training, support local agencies, and exercise your local emergency
response plans. This Full Scale Communications Exercise is open to all
Amateur Radio Stations! Please consider checking into one of the
scheduled nets. It is a great time to check out your equipment and to
test simplex coverage from your home station.
County ARES/RACES groups may be conducting local exercises during these
two days, so please check with your ARES Emergency Coordinator to see
what is planned for your county. Monitor your county tactical
frequency for updates.
Statewide Activities:
Statewide nets will be conducted on two hour intervals starting at 0900
Monday and running through Tuesday. General Net Schedules will be 0900,
1100, 1300 and 1500. The State Emergency Operations Center will act as
Net Control for the statewide nets. Priority will be given to traffic
from County EOC's or Incident Command locations but all amateur
stations are encourage to check in and provide information from your
location. Follow Net Control instructions for format of your traffic.
Frequencies-
Statewide communications will be following the ARES/RACES Tactical
Guide.
Simplex 146.595 PL tone 156.7- Stations in the Local Columbia Area may
be asked to relay traffic to stations located out on coverage range.
If possible, we'd like to have some coastal stations send traffic on
this frequency and it be relayed across various counties to the SEOC.
This will simulate loss of repeater coverage and demonstrate Amateur
Radio Operator's ability to move messages without infrastructure.
HF- 3.990 MHz - 3.9935 MHz LSB and/or 7.323 MHz LSB
HF stations are welcome to check in and relay messages from other
stations. There will be opportunity for a station remote from the
State EOC to act as net control depending on conditions.
SCHEART analog network.
The VHF network will be linked statewide during the nets. It will be
unlinked outside of the nets and available for stations to practice
linking using their DTMF or to pass routine traffic
The UHF network will be used by health care organizations at various
periods during the two days but may not follow the same times as the
statewide HF and VHF nets. During periods that hospitals are not
participating in the exercise, users are free to practice DTMF linking
and pass routine traffic.
SCHEART DMR Network-
The DMR network will be in Emergency Operations Mode for verification
of communication talk group functions, message routing ,and operator
training from 8:45 to approximately 4:00 on Monday and Tuesday. There
may be periods during the day where the network is re-linked to NCPRN
network and then de-linked as training is conducted. During the time
period, users should expect the PRN talk group will only link to
repeaters within South Carolina. Out of state talk groups (Tac 1, Tac
310, DCI and Southeast) will not be operational. The DMR Local talk
group traffic coverage should remain normal. After the exercise period
each day, the DMR system will return to normal operational mode.
REMEMBER!
This is a once a year opportunity to participate with State, County,
Local Government and Non Government Organizations. It is an
opportunity to show how ham radio can be vital to a community during an
emergency and helps ensure spectrum remains available for our hobby.
Deviations to this plan such as exact net times or statewide coverage
of the SCHEART network may occur depending on failures injected during
the exercise. Just like a real world event we need to be flexible and
adapt to a changing environment. So check-in, have fun and
demonstrate the power of Amateur Radio.
