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Amateur Radio Field Day
by Steve Katz

What would you do if your telephone and cell phone suddenly stopped working? How would you communicate with your family and friends? What if you had to dial 911 in emergency? Amateur Radio operators know what to do because we train for such contingencies.

Each year in late June we Amateur ("ham") Radio operators across North America demonstrate our emergency preparedness at an outdoor exercise known as Field Day. We set up portable radio stations in parks, malls, and public places away from our permanent home stations and engage in on-the-air activity that tests our equipment and operating skills.
We try to contact as many other Field Day stations as possible during a 24 hour round-the-clock period. This year it starts at 2 pm Saturday, June 25, and goes until 2 pm Sunday, the 26th.

The Newark Amateur Radio Association (NARA) will operate our station, N8ARA, from the top of Horns Hill, north of Newark. We will start setting up our antennas and equipment Saturday morning, and we plan to have our station operational by 2 pm.

"It is a real challenge to use these field stations with temporary antennas and emergency power from generators, solar panels, or batteries," says Ron Jones, an active ham who also serves as President of NARA. "It simulates a real-life emergency such as an earthquake, flood, or hurricane, where electric power is out, phone and cell phones don't work because towers are down, back-up power failed, or their networks are overloaded. Or maybe the Internet is unavailable, or  many structures such as buildings, homes, roads, bridges, and hams' highly effective home station antennas are damaged. In a real emergency, when all other means of communication fail, Amateur Radio has proven time and again that it's a fail-safe method that comes through. But, to be proficient, Amateur Radio operators have to stay in practice, and that's what happens at Field Day."

Amateur Radio is more than just a hobby. It's a public service licensed by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). It is not the same as Citizens Band ("CB"), which is an unlicensed service available to anyone and legally limited to 5 watts using voice communications only. "Hams have to pass a test to get a license," notes Mike Mickelson, an active ham who lives north of Granville and participates in Field Day every year. "The test no longer requires Morse Code skill, although the code is still a popular means of communications. And along with voice and code, many different digital modes (computer to computer direct, via radio waves) are highly popular, too."

"Field Day is also about fun!" says Steven Katz, a Granville ham. "Hams and their families get together and have a good time. We plan our operation weeks in advance. We gather our equipment together on the morning of Field Day and set up our portable stations before the event. Throughout the 24-hour period we eat well, drink a LOT of coffee, stay up all night long, work together to overcome unexpected challenges which can be anything from lightning storms to lost screws and forgotten cable connectors, and we succeed in making thousands of contacts with other Field Day stations."

Although it was predicted that Amateur Radio would die out as a result of the Internet, in fact it is a more popular activity than ever, as hams have learned to incorporate the Internet into the hobby in imaginative ways. The number of licensed hams is now actually at an all-time high and on the increase. There are over 28,000 hams in Ohio, over 780,000 hams in the United States and over 3 million in the world. Ohio Governor Mike DeWine has even officially declared June 25-26 as "Amateur Radio Operators' Appreciation Days."

Field Day is free and open to the public. The best time to visit is Saturday afternoon when the event is in full swing. No advance notice is necessary. Those who want to make on-the-air contacts can do so under supervision of a licensed club member. To find the NARA station, N8ARA, drive up to the top of Horns Hill and find the western shelter house.

For more information on NARA, visit www.n8ara.org.

For information on ham radio in general visit www.arrl.org.

#ARRL #HamRadio #ARRLFD