PLEASANT
HILL -- Ham radio operators are the go-to resource when all other means
of communication are shut down due to a massive power outage or being
the sole source of communication in remote rural areas.
They offer
reassurance to families who can't reach loved ones through conventional
means during a natural disaster, be it earthquake, fire or severe
winter storm. And they are able to transmit urgent information in the
event of a serious accident.
On Field Day this Saturday, Pleasant
Hill resident Bill Brink, a retired U.S. Air Force radio communications
and radar noncommissioned officer, and local fellow "hams" will set up
their own local access network, activate generators and test equipment
to communicate with other participating groups throughout the United
States and Canada.
The annual round-the-clock test and
demonstration at Dinosaur Hill Park is open to the public. Participating
stations, located in parks, forests, people's backyards or shopping
malls, are all operated off the grid.
Brink says that more than
35,000 amateur radio operators took part in last year's event and an
estimated 1,440 sites are registered this year.
Contestants in the
competition, sponsored by the Amateur Radio Relay League, get one point
for voice contact and two points for a successful transmission of Morse
code.
"Active hams have their hands in (myriad) pots," Brink
says, noting their participation in CERT (Community Emergency Response
Team) and other emergency relief organizations.
Brink
humbly describes his avocation as being well-suited for "an old retired
guy," who says he likes challenges and fixing things, was among the
operators at the AMGEN bike race finish line a few weeks ago.
While
law enforcement and other emergency response entities have more
capabilities to spot and instantly respond to a situation -- from an
accident to a lost child at a crowded event -- the ham operators are the
other critical "eyes and ears, (as these agencies) cant' be
everywhere," Brink says.
For the first time, the Martinez Amateur
Radio Club is participating in the event that will introduce its
members to working with large towers and antennae that reliably pick up
greater frequency and reach more people at greater distances, chapter
president Dave Piersall explains.
Piersall initially learned Morse
code in the Army, got his ham operator license in the late 1970s, kept
it active to be able to help in a crisis, and to enjoy a hobby that has
connected him with other hams more than 11,000 miles away.
Today,
Piersall, who retired from the Department of Veterans Affairs, is among
the 717,000 people who have ham operator licenses in the United States,
and 2.5 million worldwide, which is the highest number of licensees to
date.
"There's more to it that turning the radio on and dialing a
frequency. There's some technique involved," says Piersall, a volunteer
amateur radio operator with the Contra Costa County Sheriff's Office, as
part of its civil emergency service program.
Pleasant Hill
resident Lew Jenkins, a retired U.S. Army captain and former electrical
engineer, has communicated with other hams in more than 300 countries,
including from his backyard, 600-square-foot "radio shack" -- all
without wires.
"All you need between us and people on the other
side of the world is air," says Jenkins, an Antioch High School alumnus
who relayed 13,000 email messages following the 1989 Loma Prieta
earthquake, and was a western conduit in a ham radio network that
relayed messages immediately following the protest at Tiananmen Square.
"We're
concerned about the graying of the (qualified) 'ham' cadre. So, we want
to encourage young people to come out (to Field Day) and see the
excitement of person-to-person communication over short-wave radio."
Harry
Styron, a Walnut Creek resident and member of the Mt. Diablo Amateur
Radio Club, describes some of the confounding variables that are
encountered when seeking faraway frequency connections with its
refracting radio waves bouncing off the ionosphere: the optimal angle;
the earth's curvature; the variation due to atmospheric changes, be it
time of day or night, or season.
But Styron, who volunteers as an
amateur radio operator doing backup communications for the U.S. Air
Force's division of the Department of Homeland Security, enjoys his
brief exchanges, having reached operators in Russia, Chile and
Argentina.