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Ham Radio Still Growing In the iStuff Age
vhfer writes "From NPR comes this story about old-school communications in the age of Twitter: 'Only a few years ago, blogs listed ham radio alongside 35 mm film and VHS tape as technologies slated to disappear. They were wrong. Nearly 700,000 Americans have ham radio licenses — up 60 percent from 1981, a generation ago. And the number is growing.' The article goes on to say that while there's plenty of 60-plus year old hams, there's also a growing contingent of teens. I just met a 14-year-old, licensed in 2009. Getting rid of the Morse Code requirement sure helped in that regard. So does the fact that the test questions (and the answers) are freely available, legally, on the Internet. Study, take the test, hang the license certificate on the wall. Your geek cred gets an immediate boost. And who knows? Maybe the next time there's a Haiti-earthquake-sized disaster, you'll be one of the thousands of ham volunteers who provided the only communications in/out of Haiti for weeks following the quake, not to mention all of the tactical comms the country had for nearly a month."
Here in Nebraska just last week we had a need for Ham radios when our telephones went dead. No problem for cell phone users until they tried to dial 911. Out came the Ham radio operators using the contingency plans for y2K parked at major intersections where people could get a hold of them and contact authorities. There are just some technologies that are just too useful to get rid of.
CS: It is all sink or swim...oh and did I mention there are sharks in that water?
I remember when I got my license when I was about 14-15 and was damn proud to get it. I had learned morse code in the Boy Scouts so that test was fairly easy. I remember going to "Ham Fests" where you could buy any sort of electronic gizmo, whether for your ham radio, a box of floppies, home grown software, etc. I even bought a fairly powerful FM transmitter. Taking the morse code out of it takes away the learning and the challenge, and also the feeling of accomplishment.
The Revolution Will Not Be Televised
My 4x4 group (hot4x4.ca) uses VHF almost exclusively due to its reach above and beyond CB. Cell phones usually don't work where we travel either. Depending on the terrain, we can reach over 75kms from each other on just the 2m band w/o a repeater. This only requires a technician (basic) license as well.
Add in the APRS + Garmin GPS, and your rig turns into a mobile GPS transmitter. We then can track each other, which makes it really easy to find each other. APRS also allows us to send text messages via a p2p network of Ham Radios. Example: we had guys in Reno who we needed to contact because we broke a part on the Rubicon. Couldn't reach them via radio, but with APRS, our txt msgs could be relayed.
None of this requires anything but the first class license. Its an awesome hobby and there is a lot you can do with it, in addition to Geek cred and ecomm or search/rescue.
I was asleep (off watch) at night on a small sailing yacht crossing the North Sea. The guy on watch woke me and asked what it means when a ship flashes a light three times. After asking him a few sleepy questions I figured out that the ship was flashing dot-dot-dash with a signaling lamp, the Morse letter "U" which, at sea, means "you are proceeding into danger". After going on deck and confirming that, I helped him tack the yacht and avoid passing between the ship and the oil drilling platform that it was towing. Morse is still used on HF and with Aldis lamps as a backup when more modern modes fail.