District 10 will be running some lightweight, easy-to-follow activities throughout 2021 to help you s keep those messaging and digital muscles that they needed for SET in-shape. As any potential activation may have different requirements, the objective is to keep a variety of messaging modalities fresh in people’s minds, ensuring we have as many tools in the toolbox as possible when needed.
We will also gamify this, keeping track of who participates in each county and how each county stacks up against each other within District 10. We’ll come up with some sort of prize at the end of the year if people really get into it, but details to follow on that later.
Each month, we’re asking you to send a message to AB8M or KM8V via a different method. That’s it – one month, one message. 🙂
February & June – Winlink: Send a message over the air to a winlink gateway addressed to AB8M or KM8V. The message should include Callsign, Name, City, County, and the winlink gateway they used.
You can find local Winlink RMS Gateways here, or look them up in Winlink Express.
March & July – Packet Radio: Send a message over the air to a packet node addressed as a bulletin to ARES@CLE. The bulletin should include Callsign, Name, City and County.
KM8V-1 is on the western edge of Cuyahoga County w/ coverage into Lorain County. AB8M-1 is on the southern side of Cuyahoga County w/ coverage into Lorain and Medina counties. W8HAC-1 is the eastern side of Cuyahoga County w/ coverage into Lake and Geauga counties.
(If other D10 counties want to link a packet node, or want training for your ARES team specific about using packet, let me know.) Click here for info on Cleveland area packet nodes.
To send a bulletin via packet:
Connect to one of the packet BBSes. In Cuyahoga, this would be W8HAC-1, AB8M-1 or KM8V-1.
Enter SB ARES@CLE and follow the prompts to send a bulletin to ARES@CLE.
To send a bulletin via Winlink Express:
Compose a message to bull/ares@cle in Winlink Express and post to outbox.
Connect to one of the packet BBSes and send. In Cuyahoga, this would be W8HAC-1, AB8M-1 or KM8V-1.
April & August – NBEMS & ICS-213: Generate an ICS-213 message to be transmitted via FLMSG addressed to AB8M or KM8V. Each county EC should arrange for a contact person to collect the ICS-213’s from their county.
This should be done over the air via simplex or a local repeater. District 10 will host a weekly net on the 147.015 repeater to collect the messages from these county liaison stations. Stations outside of District 10 that want to participate should send their traffic to the Buckeye Net NBEMS HF net or the Ohio Digital Emergency Network.
May & September – NTS: Send a radiogram addressed to AB8M, Broadview Heights OH 44147 or KM8V, Fairview Park OH 44126. The radiogram should be less than 25 words. There are multiple ways to inject a radiogram, including TWO local NTS nets within District 10:
- Tri-County Traffic & Training Net (Geauga County). Meets every Tuesday, Friday, and Sunday at 9pm ET.
- Burning River Traffic Net (Lorain County). Meets every evening at 9:30pm ET.
- Ohio Single Sideband Net. Meets 3 times daily on 80 meters.
- Another amateur station can originate one on your behalf.
- As a last resort, generate a message via the radiogram form in winlink and it will send it to the region 8 mailbox for injection into NTS.
October. No planned D10 activity, normally when SET is, focus on that.
November & December: Happy holidays!
Each month a reminder will be sent to this distro with specifics around that month’s activities. I don’t know about the rest of you – but I can honestly say that after a few months of not using a mode I have to stop and shake some of the rust off (how did I do that on my radio again?). Let me know if you have additional questions.
Thanks!
-doug
73 de AB8M