Boulder County hiker thankful for rescuers and ham radio operators: 'I was lucky'

http://www.timescall.com/top-storie...-county-hiker-thankful-rescuers-and-ham-radio

AB0MY, Bill Eberle

Rob
AD0IU

 

Love it-
A great ending!

 

Awesome story! I wish I had my radio on at the time. I use the Colorado Connection repeaters frequently. I guess this shows the importance of monitoring.

 

Congratulations!

 

Great narrative and it shows how amateur radio can really help in an emergency situation. I must take issue with the article's characterization of amateur radio as "somewhat dated technology". Anyone who is active in the hobby knows that it has kept up with the times and uses the latest developments in digital and electronics technology that is legally allowed.

 

It also demonstrates the value of wide area linked repeaters. Boulder County is a good distance from Colorado Springs, unlikely they would have been in contact on a single repeater, even in Colorado.

 

Maybe... But what was required in this case was the ability to reach any base station, or for that matter anybody who was in a region of good cell phone coverage. There was no need to reach Colorado Springs in particular; they just needed some way to relay the help request to appropriate first responders.

Sure, wide area linked repeaters may have more listeners, and therefore may be more likely to have someone listening who can help. But a standalone system, as long as it was popular enough to have someone listening who could make a phone call, might have done the job.

Anyway, the equipment and people that were there DID work very well that day. Good story, and a job well done by all.

 

I tend to agree with this. With little traffic on most repeaters, they would get more use if they were linked anyway. I can name 10 within 25 miles of here that probably rarely get a hit. But, if you linked some of them to towns further out, guys who live 50 or 60 miles apart could talk on repeaters with relatively small footprints. Then it would be more likely that someone would be listening to almost any repeater at any given time. That would make them more suited for emergencies should one arise.

 

This man was very lucky that other people were in area and that one of them had a ham radio. Colorado still has some very remote locations where cell service is nonexistant. Ham radio saves lives. I have first hand knowledge of this. The Colorado connection is a great system I have used it several times and the coverage area huge. My hats off to all of the Ham operators involved.

 

Even luckier that none were in a HOA according to the comment left in that article

 

"Outdated" is the wrong word. Amateur radio may be old technology, but it sure isn't "outdated."

 

An 8 track player, now that's outdated..