Ham Radio Served as Main Link to Disaster Area

SonicSpike writes "A University of Central Florida ham radio operator K4VUD (and founder of their film program) was caught in Port Blair during the earthquake and following tsunami! He and a team of other ham radio operators arrived in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands to setup the region's first ham station 2 weeks prior to the disaster. Once they realized what happened they immediately began transmitting for 20 straight hours using car batteries as a power source. Most cellular and land-line communication was down. His team became the main link to the rest of the world from the region."

Comments

Another good reason for BPL....

[ColdWetDog]

Just another reminder (the World Trade Center should serve as another one in recent memory) that Amateur radio frequencies should be protected from spectrum auctions and Broadband over Power Lines (BPL).

Sometimes just making money isn't the best thing.

73 - KL1SA

Re:Another good reason for BPL....

[mvsopen]

BPL just might spell the death of Amateur Radio. Think about it, for most of us, the original purpose of obtaining an amateur radio license was to

a) To talk to people in distant places

b) Perform public service (RACES/ARES, etc)

c) Be able to fix/build/repair your own radio gear.

Now, let's see what happens today:

a) Anyone can plug in a $4 mic, use VoIP, and "talk" to almost anywhere on Earth, no license or self-study required.

b) Whip out your cell phone. That is unless a disaster hits, and all the cell sites are down, or your 40 min. battery dies. Also the "big news guys" literally take over a cell site. CNN's truck logs in via cell at every major story, and keeps an open line as a backup. If even 200 reporters did this, kiss off any chance of getting a cell signal, since the towers would be overloaded

c) How many parts inside a modern radio are actually user-servicable? I mean, I *can* probably replace a blown out chip-capacitor, if I had to, but when it is smaller than a pencil point, and 5 seconds of extra heat would wipe out the printed circuit board by lifting the traces, is this something you would want to do to a $2000 piece of amateur radio? The new ICOM rig sells for more than $10,000! Who would ever want to "modify" something like that? Rich de KY6O (Extra class license holder. Proof that if I can do it, anyone can. For more info on obtaining a license, see http://www.arrl.org/ which is the official site of US amateur radio operations)

Re:That's life

[the angry liberal]

Opportunity knocks on people's door in the most bizarre way

Not as much as you may think. The media likes to discover a lot of things that were obvious for many years, especially if they can hang on to the disaster-happy public long enough to play one more commercial or display another banner. Ham and CB radio have served in just about every natural or man-made disaster since they have been in the hands of citizens.

I feel sadness inside everytime it occurs to me people think the reason to buy a two-way radio is to chit-chat about BS over public air-waves. These are powerful tools, baby.

Re:Why so slow to react?

[YrWrstNtmr]

1. The full extent wasn't (and still isn't) known.
2. Maybe the aussies actually had to load stuff on the ships. You know...stuff that people might need, like medical supplies, water, blankets. Does no good to send empty ships.
3. It takes quite a while for a carrier battle group (the Abraham Lincoln) to steam several thousand miles. Unless you know of another way to get helicopters and 15,000 navy people across a few thousand miles of open ocean.

It seems to me you're bitching just to be bitching.

Re:Why so slow to react?

[Scrameustache]

If they had communications from the disaster, why did it take the international community a week to react.

You think there are cargo ships and helicopters loaded up 24/7 with crews, appropriate supplies and doctors just waiting for a disaster to strike?

HAM Radio in disasters

[kg4gyt]

Amateur radio has been used all over the world many many times during disaster. Hurricanes here in the states, earthquakes, tsunamis, etc. They usually go unnoticed, despite being the only source of communication at times. Severe storm warnings are usually issued after HAMs report, via radio, that there is in fact a severe storm (after undergoing training of course). Without us even knowing it they can be a huge part of our daily lives.

Its good to see that such a useful, threatened hobby can show one of its many goodsides to the world by helping out.

73 de kg4gyt

Q: How likely??

[the_rajah]

A: Very likely. Contrary to your belief, it does not require that Joe Ham have a lot of power or a huge antenna on a tower to communicate with the other side of the world. Nor does it require repeaters on the HF frequencies.

I've been an FCC licensed Ham since 1958 at age 12 and operate only with low power (QRP to us hams) as a challenge precisely because making long distance contacts was too easy with even moderate power (say 100 watts) and modest wire antennas. I've communicated directly with Japan and New Zealand from my car in Illinois using a 4 watt transmitter and a 4 foot antenna on the trunk. If you get up to around 100 Watts and a reasonable wire antenna hung up in the trees in the back yard, you can very easily talk anywhere in the world, given reasonable conditions.

What good is it from the other end? I was with Project Hope in Tunisia in 1969 and provided daily "phone-patched" phone call service to the staff of about 150 people so they could stay in touch with their families back home, without having to pay the $13.00 for the first 3 minutes that the landline cost. It made a huge difference to the people on the hospital ship. In disaster situations, it's orders of magnitude more important. Some of my fellow hams here in the states provided similar communications for military and Antarctic bases for years.

To learn more about Amateur Radio, visit the ARRL website. ARRL Oh, and please, please, do not lump us in with CB folks, as nice as some of them are. Hams are tested and licensed to FCC standards prior to being allowed to put their transmitters on the air.

"Do the Right Thing. It will gratify some people and astound the rest." - Mark Twain