Board Ramps Up Focus on EmComm Issues

OK, I'm outta here.

73
Energize!

 

Perhaps I should have been more clear. What we provide is communications from the site of a disaster regarding the number of patients and their trauma level to the receiving hospitals. This would only be done when RACES has been activated, and the normal communications systems are down. The hospitals here have a very sophisticated telemetry system, including video feeds from the ambulances, that handles the necessary communications during normal times.

Like it or not, RACES is a legislated part of amateur radio, and has been for a very long time. The problem that I see is that all these entities want to make amateur radio a part of non-disaster communications, and that is just plain stupid. RACES is designed to be utilized when there are no other options, and that is the only time that amateur radio should be involved with disaster communications.

We can push part 90 all we want, but there comes a time when the part 90 systems are inoperable - yes, part 90 actually FAILS. You know, like no fuel to run the generators at the tower sites, the tower sites being currently located in a heap on the ground, etc. When that happens, amateur radio has its opportunity to serve this nation that gave us amateur radio in the first place.

We need to be careful that we do not push emergency communications too far away from amateur radio, or we will be looked at with jaded eyes when the spectrum shoppers come knocking at the FCC.

 

When properly designed Part 90 systems have failed the liklihood is quite high that amateur systems will have failed as well. What keeps amateur antennas from being a heap on the ground when the Part 90 antenna is probably on the same tower as the amateur repeater?

Amateur radio using single points of failure, e.g. 2m repeaters, are just as likely to fail as Part 90 systems if not *more likely* than a well-designed Part 90 system.

All you are doing here is echoing the ARRL mantra of "when all else fails". That has been shown over the past decade to be an absolutely false claim. When Hurricane Ike scoured Galveston Island the Part 90 system remained working while amateur capability wound up in the ocean!

Take for instance your scenario of relaying the number of patients and their trauma level to a receiving hospital. How many sites can hams man in order to provide this kind of information? Do you have enough local hams to man a tornado path on a block by block basis in order to transmit injury info back to a centralized point? Do you have enough hams available to shadow *every* police officer and fire dept search team responding to a wide spread disaster in order to maintain dispatch and logistical information communications for all field-level first responders?

If the answer to any of these is NO, then you are merely rationalizing to yourself that RACES will be of any significant use to field-level first responders in a disaster. Ask yourself how you will get the ambulances *TO* the sites where they are needed in order to serve the injured if the Part 90 comms are down and you don't have enough manpower to shadow every possible field-level first responder. If you can't get the ambulances there in the first place then exactly what info are you going to relay back to the hospital?

I once had a local ham who said we needed to get ham stations set up in all fire stations in order to provide comms in the case of a disaster. When I pointed out to him that all those trucks and men will *BE IN THE FIELD* in case of a disaster and asked him what good it would do for him to be manning the amateur equipment at the fire station all he could do was stutter!

Hams *DO* have a part to play in disaster communications. A ham station at the 911 dispatch center, manned by a volunteer, can take reports from hams where the roads are impassible and no first responders are around. The ubiquity and homogeneity of hams in the population makes this a very valuable type of operation. The biggest problem here is that the amateur population has to be disciplined to only use amateur radio when other means of comms are not available. 911 dispatch centers depend heavily on caller id/ani for input to their system in order to provide most efficient dispatch. Amateur radio relayed reports don't provide this capability.

Please note, however, that this has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with amateur radio becoming a psuedo-common carrier providing backup communications infrastructure for GO's and NGO's. RACES may have provided a valuable resource for doing this 50 years ago but not today. Self-healing fiber rings, satellite phones, and hardened Part 90 installations have pretty much obviated the need for amateur radio.

You can whine about RACES being important all you want but, to be brutally frank, the only important thing about it today is the ego-stroking it provides to those who wish to utilize it as a rationalization.

tim ab0wr

 

It is amazing how a group of supposed communicators can be so incapable of carrying out a 2-sided communication. I am through trying to talk to people whose minds are made up - I guess your mantra is "My mind is made up, don't confuse me with the facts!"

The recent collapse of virtually EVERY communications system EXCEPT amateur radio in Sana Clara County California when the "self healing fiber rings" went belly-up, surely prove that there is no need for any other communications system in America. Who needs 911 service? Who needs telephone service? Who needs communications? Well, apparently the people of Santa Clara County did, and if they had relied upon most of the posters in this thread, they would have just been told "Too bad!"

Among the things that amateur radio accomplished where ..."helped dispatch ambulances, conferred with the Poison Center on a children's poisoning case, ordered replacement blood supplies for two hospitals from San Jose Red Cross, relayed a complex major "whole hospital" day's food order to the supplier out of county, tracked down various doctors for emergency consultations and shared status updates from the area."

Bad amateur radio operators! How dare you help get an ambulance to the scene of an emergency, how dare you help prevent a child's death from poisoning, how dare you get blood supplies to a hospital! Shame! Shame! Shame!

I am so tired of the "experts" on here that talk big, but could not find their way out of their shack if the power went out.

The only people trying to massage their ego's are the ones that are incapable of giving a rats behinds about anyone other than themselves, so they despise and mock those people that actually MAKE A DIFFERENCE in the world.

 

That's exactly what they're saying, and I am sick of hearing it. Thank the BB programmers for the ignore list!

 

At the risk of exposing my naivete' . . . Why can't the hobbyists do their thing and the ARES/RACES crowd do their thing and keep the federal government/agencies out of it as much as possible? If amateur radio is the hobby, then emergency services is an element of amateur radio, but, it is not the hobby. I mean, why promulgate rules that may threaten the hobby? This is not the turn of the century when arguably amateur radio was leading edge technology but, things are different now. The need for amateur radio may not be as extreme as it once was. If the hobby itself is a "threatened species" as some have argued, why is this kind of stuff the necessary to preserve it? We should be thinking of advancing the hobby, not simply preserving it. I would submit that given the political climate, most people drawn to this kind of hobby understand the need for a certain amount of regulation but would be those that would want to stay as far away from over control as they can.

I mean if a hobbyist can contribute to an emergency situation, I would think that they would. And if the ARES/RACES crowd is in amateur radio for the emergency services aspect as opposed to the hobby, then that's fine too. But, look at how many emergency services groups there are with communications capabilities similar to amateur radio (I'm sure I will leave someone out): Civil Air Patrol, MARS, Coast Guard Auxilliary, REACT and I'm sure there are others. But, the difference is that they are focused on emergency services, not radio communication as a hobby.

I've been involved in emergency services work both as a volunteer and professionally. Both in a "worker" role and a statewide leadership role. The part that concerns me is some of the regimentation that takes place FOR THE VOLUNTEERS. Professionally, If I take your money, I take your orders. Quite frankly, some of the rules for volunteerism is counterproductive to the cause.

Given that emergency communications is rather limited vs. hobby communication, for lack of a better term, is it really fair or feasible to turn the hobby world on its ear?

Don't jeopardize the foundation of the hobby simply to promote an element of it.

 

YOZ, I agree completely with what you are saying.

The problem as I see it is that some people want to completely remove any emergency communications aspect of amateur radio. Most of these same people can be found in other threads harping that everyone needs to know morse code because CW is the easiest emission to get through in an emergency. Huh? If emergency communications has no place in amateur radio, then why should we know the easiest communications method to use in an emergency? The little merry-go-round just keeps spinning faster and faster, and it is beginning to cause some serious rotational injuries I fear.

There is more than enough room in amateur radio for everyone - rag chewers, contesting, meteor scatter, QRP, repeaters, etc.

We are all individuals, and we all came to this hobby for different reasons. If Johnny wants to contest and Suzie wants to prepare for disaster communications, great for both of them!

We certainly need to fight against the commercialization of amateur radio, but shunning all aspects of emergency communications is not the way to do it - that will only result in us being looked at as selfish. We need to let the world know that we are ready, willing, and able to help in a disaster, but that other than that we are simply a group of hobbyists.

 

OK, I presume you are saying you made a difference. Congratulations. Toot a bigger horn, as I don't hear you very well over here.

The point being made by me and many others like me is amateur radio is NOT a Part 90 communications system, and it is NOT a substitute for professional communications systems and operators. And it never should be. When other systems have actually failed, amateur radio can be of service, certainly, and it should be. That is PART of our mandate for existence, but it is NOT the ONLY part. Nor is it given a higher mandate than the others.

What we do not wish to see is amateur radio becoming a regular backup for Part 90 systems. That turns it into something it was never intended to be, and it changes the entire face of the Part 97 operations. We do not want to become 'professionals.' If we do, we become tightly governed and strictly regimented and any hobby aspect disappears entirely. In fact, we become a different radio service - we BECOME Part 90.

You can't seem to grasp the idea that so many have expressed, that we are not anti-emergency communications. We are anti- turning ham radio into Part 90 Public Safety systems!! Probably most of us have assisted in emergencies. I certainly have, quite a few times. But I did not become a ham just to be a hero. There are other ways to be of 'hero service,' such as being a reserve police officer or a volunteer EMT or firefighter. Join a CERT organization, do hospital volunteer work.

But leave Part 97 amateur radio out of Part 90. THAT is what so many of us are pleading for. Don't turn this hobby into an extension of the Dept of Homeland Security, the FBI, the sheriff's department, or the local hospital. We are NONE of those.

Can we still volunteer? Absolutely. I do and I will. I am even a member of ARES, and I was the DEC of this district. I volunteer with the local EC.

But there is no way I think I am a part of hospital communications. I am not a part of police communications. I am not a part of fire department communications. I am not a part of forestry division communications. I am an amateur radio operator who may volunteer to assist if someone shows me I am needed. I own no vests, no light bars, no sirens, no badges. I don't sit and monitor a scanner so if I hear an emergency, I can grab my "go kit" and dash to the scene. I don't 'show up' at traffic accidents to direct traffic, or at a fire scene to 'take over" communications. I don't tick off the REAL emergency personnel by coming on scene, without being asked to, and telling them, 'Hey, I'm a HAM, and I can solve all your comm problems." (Even if you don't have any.)

Be in the background. I sure don't need any publicity. Don't give ham radio a black eye (and it has one in many areas) by forcing your "I'm the big time expert" views -- or rather attempting to force them - on local REAL authorities.

My fight is to stop amateur radio from becoming a public safety auxilliary. That doesn't prevent it from being used, now and then, once in a while, only when requested. But hopefully, by remaining Part 97, and not Part 90, we can avoid being a PITA to the local and regional authorities, and we can keep this 100 year old hobby on track.

Ed

 

I have not tried that feature yet. Been wondering if I should.

However, then how would I know the opinions of those who disagree with me if I refused to read their postings?

Or should I know their opinions? Perhaps not. It does seem like it would be easier to just block all disagreeing opinons! Then every one I read would agree with my own. And then what would be the point in posting anyway?

Hmmmm. Not sure I want to try the ignore list.

Ed

 

Do you count it as a Part 90 "failure" when the administrators of the system decide, up front, not to purchase an equivalent Part 90 backup system - but instead decide to rely on Part 97 spectrum as their backup?


I do. If you have activated your Part 97 backup, your primary Part 90 system AND your backup Part 90 system better be completely inoperable, IMHO. But in several localities we've learned about, this isn't the case.

 

Really? I notice you didn't address ONE SINGLE ISSUE I brought up.

*I*, on the other hand, did address what you brought up.

Who is incapable of carrying on a 2-sided conversation?

Really? Now who is making up facts?

Did the Part 90 communications for the fire and police go down? No, they did not!

The only thing that was lost was telephone service -- LANDLINE SERVICE AT THAT!.

And you think that hams provided *any* kind of backup for the telephone service? Hardly.

This is *exactly* the kind of rationalization that is seen from emcomm whacker ALL THE TIME.

Hams helped dispatch ambulances? I can't find this in any documentation on the outage. Check out http://www.cupertinoares.org/arc/activations/ATT-Comm-Outage-UER.pdf to see a report on the outage.

*Exactly* why did hams have to handle ordering replacement blood supplies when CELL PHONES WERE WORKING? The announcements to the public were even specific about telling citizens TO USE CELL PHONES to contact the 911 dispatch center!!! Why didn't someone at the hospital pick up a cell phone to place the order? Same for the food order?

I'm sorry but most of this sounds like hams NOT making the best use of available resources. *Professional* communicators wouldn't just use ham radio because it is available. If cell phones were still working *THAT* is what they would use!

Yes! Bad amateur operators. I was a flood site a few years ago assisting evacuees. One family needed to contact relatives to let them know they were ok. Do you think I just used my 2m HT to pass a message which would have needed a 3rd person relay to their relatives? No, I just handed them my cell phone!!!!!

You are now doing nothing but whining.

Perhaps you should try addressing the issues I brought up instead of just using ad hominem attacks.

Yeah, right. People that don't agree with you don't give a rats behind about anyone!!

ROFL!!!!!

Address the issues I brought up, then perhaps some "2-sided communications" can take place.

tim ab0wr

 

Ed,

I believe the idea would be to come up with a better, more politically worthy, alternative to EMCOMM. Something would need to displace it. Then, you'll have a winner.

In today's socialist-charged, government-growing climate, EMCOMM is the current king. The League only wishes to latch on to this wave. It has done so, and continues.

Steve, NL7W

 

0WR - Everyone involved in this situation PRAISED the response that amateur radio provided, including Gilroy City Administrator/Director of Emergency Services Thomas J. Haglun and Gilroy Police Chief Denise Turner.

The only people that want to minimize it are people that were not involved in the incident. And as to your allusion that I am trying to blow my own horn here, I live in Arizona, I had nothing to do with this incident. I do, however, have the ability to perform basic research and stay abreast of what amateur radio is doing to assist this nation.

As for your cell phone nonsense, read this about Santa Cruz County from Santa Cruz County Senior Dispatcher Stephanie Zube, "NETCOM, the dispatch center for most police and fire agencies in Santa Cruz County, was able to receive 911 calls placed from land lines, but could not receive calls placed from cell phones, said Santa Cruz County Senior Dispatcher Stephanie Zube. "Because the only phone number many land line phone owners could call was 911", she said the center received "countless calls" regarding the blackout: "At least several people attempted to call 911 before driving themselves to the emergency room. A lady in Gilroy fled her home when a robber broke in, and couldn't call 911 before fleeing to a nearby firehouse."

I see a cell phone failure here, so your "solution" fails.

The hospital's phone system only worked internally, they could not call out - THAT is why they needed assistance to order supplies.

I am NOT categorically against your position on this issue, but you really need to know the SPECIFIC POINTS OF FAILURE before you suggest a "solution" that would have solved the issue.

What we need to do instead of bickering here on QRZ, is to educate the public, and the government, about what they need to have in place to handle a situation such as this one.

Instead of complaining about amateur radio being used, and suggesting that people use their cell phones, even though cell phones could not call 911 in this particular incident, we need to approach them with FACTS, and show what could have been pre-planned to overcome each difficulty. When you flippantly suggest an alternative that was not feasible, you only look like a fool, and THAT is what makes people not want any input from amateur radio.

 

And what of Part 90 systems? Where's your comment here?

I respectfully remind amateurs... Amateur Radio EMCOMM is a "last resort," adjunct communications medium only. Part 97, or Amateur Radio, does not and will not conjoin with Part 90 systems. The sooner Public Safety / EMS Officials, and Amateurs, realize this -- the better.

The idea here is to build out professional-use Part 90 systems. Use and rely on those, instead of the lesser Part 97 service -- a service whose main thrust and purpose is NOT public safety or EMS communications.

Thanks.

 

We have portable repeaters, simplex, portable antennas, etc. One of the advantages of amateur radio is that a fully functional communications system can be very portable.

In the ocean? Really? According to the Kingwood Observer newspaper "Amateur radio operators were quick to respond locally. Members of the Amateur Radio Emergency Service immediately set up a communications network to assist the Community Response Task Force. The CRTF is a coalition of governmental entities, private businesses, faith-based organizations and nonprofit groups who have banded together to serve northeast Harris and East Montgomery counties.

Operators manned stations for the city of Humble, city of Houston, Atascocita Volunteer Fire Department, Memorial Hermann Northeast and Kingwood hospitals, and the Harris County Office of Emergency Management. They assisted in damage assessment reports to county officials by using voice and digital communications. When many lost phone and Internet service, these amateur stations continued to operate by sending e- mails via their amateur radios, using a program called Airmail."

There is this little thing called ICS, and it creates things called command posts. In wide-scale emergencies, ambulances are kept in staging areas, and sent out as needed. When the ambulance is dispatched by the medical command post, it is known where they are going, how many patients they are picking up, the general status of those patients, etc. The medical command post will route the ambulance to the nearest hospital that is capable of handling their patients. The accepting hospital is then notified of the incoming patients so that they can be prepared for them.

Through the wonder of ICS and command posts that handle each segment of the incident, you do not need a ham on every block or shadowing each police officer or fire crew.

Read the above response about ICS. You should really look into taking an ICS course, it will TEACH you how these issues are handled in the real world.

I cannot say anything about that situation that you did not already say.

Agreed.

That mantra has been proven wrong again, and again, and again.

I guess you know better than ALL of the states that USE AND FUND RACES operations. You should really get in touch with all those governors and set them straight so that they can use all that wasted money for something else!

With all the budget cuts happening here in Arizona, RACES funding was not touched. Arizona may be stupid in a lot of ways, but at least they know better than to rely on "self-healing fiber rings, hardened part 90 installations, and satellite phones" to the exclusion of everything else!

Have I addressed each of your concerns now?