Faulkner County Amateur Radio Club W5AUU -- the meeting, Tuesday, January 13, 2009
Meeting was called to order at 6:30 pm by President Frankie Parks
A roster of members was circulated. The following checked as present:
Larry Appleby KC5YWC
Kelly Boswell KA5MGL
Perry Carlton AE5EE
George Carroll N5GC V.P
Ken Chafin N5RKC
David Doty N5XF
Kayla Dowdy KE5JYX
Lynette Dowdy KD5QMD
Doyle Phillip KC5BAY
Jim Grinder N5TSG
Bob Hambuchen N5OMV
Gary Hawkins KD5ZQF
Gerald Hogue AE5GH
Stefan Johnson KE5YBN
Wayne Johnston KD4TA Sec/Treas
Brian Kessler N1WNC
Marlene Kessler KE5HQU
Glenn King N5GK
Warren Lindgren KE5TT
Eric Martin KE5SFY
Lynn McCaig N5RWW
Will McFadden KB5DDX
John Nordlund AD5FU
Frankie Parks K5FRP Pres.
David Turner KD5JKX
John Webb WE4BB
Roger Williamson N5QNA
Kathy Williamson KB5RMY
*Introduction of Special Guests*:
Mark Lebetter -- Logistics Coordinator, Conway 911 Center
Shelia Maxwell -- Director, Faulkner County Office of Emergency Management
Dirk Sutterfield -- Deputy Director, Faulkner County Office of Emergency Management
Randy Wright -- Central Arkansas UHF Group (CAUHF) President, Arkansas Section Public Information Coordinator
Joshua Carroll -- CAUHF Group Web Team Lead, Assistant Arkansas Section Public Information Coordinator, and creator of the WARN Instant Message system.
And our own John Nordlund, Arkansas Section Emergency Coordinator
*Treasurer Report*: Wayne Johnston KD4TA -- $1691.37 in the bank; dues collected Friday and the night of the meeting; the club has two outstanding bills -- post office box fee $42.00 for year; a bill that Kelly Boswell paid for replacement the duffel bags used for storing ropes for tower projects -- without objection those bills will be paid.
*Old Business:*
Dues Collection
*Dues Collection* will be ongoing into February. The rate is $10.00 per individual and $15.00 for family (defines as all living under the same roof).
Repeater Reports
*Repeater Reports:*
George Carroll reports that the 147.03 repeater is up and running. He and Glenn King went out on Sunday and gut the audio balanced so that incoming and outgoing signals had clarity. The members need to be aware that the tones have been switched. The 114.8 Hz is the local tone that does not go out over the link even when the link is energized and you can go out over the link. If you use the 110.9 hz tone, then the signal will go out if the link is energized. Set your HT for two channels.
Glenn King reports that the 145.21 repeater has been rebuilt by Glenn. He completed it on Saturday, but has to check the tuning to be sure the are right, and then it will be ready to put back on the Hogan Road ridge site.
The 6 m repeater (450) at the other location is dependent upon antenna work that has to be completed, but the cold weather is not conducive for our tower climber (Lynn McCaig).
No telling when the 146.97 repeater will be back up. Right now it works with or without a tone, but within a week or so the tone will be back in place for it to be used. They had problems with the tone circuit, so they turned it off. The 146.97 repeater is linked to 443.800. Once the 145.21 repeater is back, you will be able to link it to other parts of the network, including the 443.525
George Carroll reports that packet node is functional and has been moved over to Glenn King's house. Once the antennas are in place on Glenn King's tower, the packet system will be operational.
The packet node was returned to W5AUU from the state ADEM with four items on it that had to be signed for by the OEM Faulkner County. The plan is to replace those state owned parts and return them to the state. George bought two packet nodes TNC for the FCARC to take the place of the ones that belonged to the state or others. These VHF nodes have been replaced with the ones owned by the FCARC. The 6 meter state owned node will be replaced with FCARC equipment.
*New Business:*
Emergency Call Tree
*Emergency Call Tree*.
Glenn King reports that the version of the call tree alert notification chart passed out at the meeting was the one from last year. Any FCARC members who would like to be called out or should be taken off the call tree should call Glenn. Whenever Faulkner County OEM calls and needs support the call tree would be activated. A unannounced test of the call tree was conducted in mid December as part of the Simulated Emergency Test (SET). A dozen members would have been able to respond had it been a real emergency. They checked into the net.
John Nordlund. Arkansas Section Emergency Coordinator: Dennis Dura from ARRL Headquarters conducted a totally unannounced alert and has said that more will follow entirely without warning. No one outside of the HQ had any idea that the call was coming. FCARC is commended for having their test and the call tree.
Emergency SOP
*Emergency SOP.*
A second item passed out by Glenn King was the FCARC Emergency SOP as revised. Glenn functions as the Emergency Coordinator for and ARES system and also as the Communications and Warning Officer for Faulkner County under the OEM as part of the RACES system.
The old SOP probably had too much detail and listed specific things that the FCARC would do for Red Cross, Salvation Army, ADEM. This new SOP breaks down functions as to what the FCARC would do for agencies who request assistance with emergency communications. The draft SOP will be on the club web site. Members are asked to take a look and many any changes that may be needed.
Glenn also will be checking the phone tree and rosters for accuracy of home phones, work phones, cell phones so that people can be contacted in an emergency. That information will only be made available to those who have a need to know and the officials from Faulkner County and Conway that we will support.
The call tree also tied in with SKYWARN
On March 12 from 6:30 to 9 the OEM center at 57 Acklin Gap Road will have a Storm Spotter class.
This last year when ADEM moved to their new quarters was the first time the FCARC did not support a state office. The club was formed in 1961 and supported the state civil defense offices that was located across from the hospital (now a parking lot!). FCARC will no longer support the state ADEM in their newer location at Camp Robinson.
George Carroll. Glenn and George met with Mark Ledbetter last week. Mark will be a real asset to our club by giving us that opening into areas were we can help Faulkner County. He was asked that the FCARC have someone at the 911 center at least once per month to test the equipment, coordinate with the folks there, and establish a visible presence. He has asked the we have four weather spotters located around the city of Conway during times of bad weather. He also wants to have a ham operator at the 911 center when the storms are rolling through the area in place to help plan before and during the stormy weather, not just after damage is inflicted. FCARC members will be needed to support these operations. Obviously the FCARC has had good participation during major storm activity, but now we need to make the response more timely and dependable, including for monthly practice and coordination. We have had good participation on the net when bad storms are evident, but we need to have support for less obvious weather systems that might cause damage. FCARC members will be called upon to practice monthly, so don't disregard Glenn's phone calls.
Mark Ledbetter. The 911 Center has several methods of communications to get information from the National Weather Service ---- an AWIN channel and an older system. Hams at the 911 Center would assist in monitoring the weather and give another tie to the NWA. The Faulkner County OEM now has a system on AWIN were all the local fire departments provide information. All the fire departments in the area participated (12 Fire Departments plus coordinators from adjacent counties) on that net during the December 2008 storms. A ham at the 911 Center would provide access for the FCARC to those same communications channels.
Mark Ledbetter. A tornado drill is scheduled for the last part of Feb, probably on a Saturday, and they want the FCARC to participate. More details to follow.
John Nordlund. A CSEP exercise is scheduled for February 24, 2009. Ham involvement has not been determined at this time.
On 17 and 18 January 2009, UAMS will move in Little Rock from their old building to the new building. This is a real world movement of critical care patients and patients on life support. Although they have AWIN communications, they are not certain that those radios will work within the old buildings. Consequently they need to have standby ham radio operators in place if those communications do not work. The move should be complete by 7:00 pm on Sunday evening, but problems could make the move last through Monday. The need is for hams with hand held radios who would do a lot of walking with the crews as patients are moved by UAMS people (if the AWIN communications do not work). Information about the move will be on the Yahoo ARES reflector. At 0700 on Saturday (Jan 17) they will start moving Neonatal ICU patients. During the move, UAMS will not accept ambulance traffic.
*Next Months Program*: For February, 2009, the program at FCARC will be presented by the Arkansas Section Manager J.M. Rowe and the new Delta Division Vice Director David Norris K5UZ. They will be discussing our relationship and involvement with the ARRL.
*FCARC Net.* Be around for the Thursday night at 7:30 pm net for the FCARC. Net Control Stations are needed -- and can sign up for a week or even a single night. Net Control Station for February is Roger Williamson.
*DEC meeting.* On Sunday, January 18, 2009 at 1300 hours at ADEM at Camp Robinson. Some changes in the ARES system will be discussed at the meeting. Those attending need to allow time to get through security and have proof of insurance and a current license.
*Toad Suck Special Event Station*. In order to meet the ARRL publication deadlines for QST, the FCARC needs to authorize participation at this time. Passed by voice vote.
*QST Magazines.* Glenn King made several years worth of QST magazines available to the members.
*Reimbursement for TNCs. *The FCARC voted to reimburse George Carroll for the TNC expenses for the repeaters.
*Main Program:*
WarnIM
*WarnIM. *A demonstration of the WarnIM system was provided for FCARC members at the meeting. The WarnIM system was developed by members of the Central Arkansas UHF Group (CAUHF) as a way to combine weather or disaster information from different official and unofficial sources and to post that information on an accessible map system on the Internet for use by the public.
During bad weather in the past, Randy Wright, President of CAUHF, has been physically located at Channel 4 TV with their weatherman Mike Francis. Now they are working with Channel 16 and Channel 7 to have liaison with SKYWARN. But SKYWARN is more than ham radio -- it is a combined effort to coordinate all the information about storms and make it available in a timely manner to the public. SKYWARN is open to anyone who has access to some form of communications and who is interested in serving the community. Some of the storm spotters, who are not hams, monitor police and sheriff nets for their dispatch channels on their scanners. What CAUHF wanted to do was to find a way to coordinate all this information and to put time stamps on it and get it out to everybody. John Robinson of the National Weather Service reported that he was starving for information and wanted a way to coordinate all the sources. The state had given him a AWIN radio and expected him to monitor the whole state. He became a supporter for the efforts to consolidate information. The result of all these efforts was WarnIM as a method to coordinate information _and record_ information.
Josh Carroll. The CAUHF website is at http://www.cauhf.org
The WarnIM screen is divided into a Google Map on one side and a visual record of IM conversations on the other. The map is overlaid with county boundary lines. The map overlay shows the current radar image -- updated every 55 seconds. The National Weather Service radar site only updates their data every 10 minutes -- the time it takes for one 360 degree Dopplar scan at all levels. The map also shows a pin image for the home of record for individuals who log into the system. In the near future the pins will show their current location rather than home of record location.
The WarnIM net control station (NCS) who is running the weather net has control over the information displayed on the screen. While the NCS can click on a pin and obtain the name, phone number, and call sign to obtain additional information from a particular location, the ordinary WarnIM user will only see first name and last initial of the person who is represented by the pin, without information about phone numbers, etc.
The WarnIM map can be zoomed in to some degree, but the overlays from the National Weather Service are bit map graphics (rather than vector graphics) and they will become pixilated and blurry at some level of close zoom.
Radar data on the map is taken from three different radar sites -- Ft Smith, Little Rock, and Shreveport -- and refreshes with them.
The left (text) side of the screen looks similar to other IM screens from other programs such as Messenger or Skype. Anyone who is logged in to WarnIM sees the text. The text side is refreshed every five seconds. Messages older than ten minutes disappear, but are archived on the system so there is a record of who reported what information and when the reports were made. The NCS has the ability to "quiet" individuals who may not comply with instructions or may flood the system with unnecessary information. They will have access, but will not be able to post until allowed to do so by NCS. Users who are unruly can be kicked out and their account disabled. There are currently ten NCS stations, and over 100 people who are registered (and that is after only a few weeks of being available to hams).
The WarnIM system is not open to the public. It can be accessed open only by hams, first responders, emergency communications people, SKYWARN certified spotters, officials, and similar users.
NWS and the Health Department both have large screens at their facilities dedicated to WarnIM.
The system has been tested on Unix, Linux, Solaris, Suzy, Mac, Windows, Vista, etc. It is compatible with most browsers like Windows, Firefox, Opera, Safari. It does not work well with Conquor.
The WarnIM system was used during the storm that moved through this area just before Christmas. Approximately twelve people (including Mike Francis from Channel 4 and John Robinson the warning coordinating meteorologist from the National Weather Service NWS) who remained on the net for many hours. After several hours John Robinson started providing the WarnIM users with information from the NWS until the storm moved into the Memphis NWS area.
Two different nets currently are built into the WarnIM system. The Weather Net on WarnIM displays the same types of information that would be visible on other weather nets. The Weather net is an off the air net conducted on the Internet (so FCC regulations do not apply) but it will be a directed net conducted as though it was on the air. The NCS accepts reportable events only (including a description of reportable events), damage reports, traffic concerns, and other information involving public safety that might be valuable to media outlets. The system provides a written record of information that is reported. Reportable information submitted to the system will be highlighted in a different color. Stations reporting information are requested to clearly and specifically identify the source -- such as a scanner monitoring a police net -- e.g sheriff deputy at location 5 reorts funnel cloud; heard on scanner.
The AR Link System Net met on WarnIM at the exact time as the on the air net. Both nets were integrated to test the system -- on the air and Internet communications.
The WarnIM system has a back end server Sequal 2005 Enterprise Edition; it can handle thousands of transmissions at once -- limited only by how fast you can read the screen. Local conditions may slow the system. A dial up connection will be slow, but the text only version without the maps or radar data could be use. It is usable for visible impaired users. It can be touched by hand device like Blackberry to make and read reports.
Future developments include a tie--in to APRS data. The problem is that raw APRS data is very difficult to integrate with some systems.
Official organization users for the system are issued alias IDs. Individuals register as persons, but organizations may be handled in another manner. Individuals should NOT open duplicate personal accounts in both their personal and official capacities.
The system operates out of California, with offsite backup in Florida. The database is backed up incrementally nightly, with a full backup performed weekly of data.
CAUHF pays for the system use in California. The system can be supported by joining the CAUHF Group by PayPal on their homepage ($20.00 per individual and $30.00 per family)
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Josh Carroll also demonstrated the way that repeater information can be accessed from the CAUHF home page under the "Repeater" link. The first is an interactive Google map that shows all CAUHF repeaters that are linked or linkable. On their web site the ones shown in blue are linked to the 443.2 repeater on Chenal Mountain; the ones in green are linkable. Click on the icon to get the frequency, offset, and tone. The second version is text information about where they are located with offset information (the text version is probably the best for those using screen readers), and the third version is in pdf state map format that can be printed.
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The meeting adjourned at 1938 hours.