North Yorkshire Fire Brigade Calls in the \'Amateurs\'

From the RSGB...



Amateur radio has once again shown its value in providing vital communications in an emergency. Last Saturday afternoon, the 19th of May, Richard Pullen, G0OII, the GB3YC repeater keeper, was monitoring activity on the 'Yorkshire Coast' 2-metre repeater. He received a call via GB3YC from Simon Hopkins, G8PXB Mobile, who was on patrol at Newtondale Forest Drive near Pickering, where he was working as a National Park volunteer Ranger in relation to the Foot and Mouth crisis. Simon had discovered a moorland fire that was getting out of control and was assisting two local men to beat out the flames. Its intensity increased and he had attempted to alert the fire brigade by mobile phone - without success, as there was no cellular network service to this remote part of the North Yorkshire Moors. However, GB3YC was offering an 'end-stop' signal to him and he used this to contact Richard, with a request that he call the fire brigade by ringing 999. This was done immediately and six fire appliances attended at the scene.



Soon after, Richard was phoned by an officer at the North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue control room in Northallerton. He said that they had lost contact with their appliances, as their radio system had no coverage in the remote area of the moor where the fire was burning. He asked if a link via the amateur radio repeater could be set up with those at the scene to relay status messages so that they would know when their appliances had arrived and the state of the incident.



Later Richard was contacted by a control room officer, who thanked the radio amateurs for their co-operation and praised the quality of service provided to the area by the GB3YC Yorkshire Coast repeater. Two hours later Simon called back through GB3YC to report that the fire was extinguished and that the appliances had left the scene. Later in the day Richard was interviewed by BBC Radio York about the incident and this was used in regional news bulletins over the weekend.