Amateur Radio Station at the National Hurricane Center , Miami Florida
WX4NHC
On-The-Air Annual Station Test
Summary Report
Saturday, May 30th, 2015
Photo:
WX4NHC
Station Test Ops: WD4R, N4LJK, K9JCL, K4AG (not pictured K4FLL)
WX4NHC TESTED AND READY FOR HURRICANE SEASON
The National Hurricane
Center's Amateur Radio Station WX4NHC conducted their Annual Station Test on
May 30th 2015.
This is the 35th year of volunteer public service by the WX4NHC Group at NHC.
WX4NHC conducts this event each year in preparation for Hurricane Season, which runs from June 1st to November 30th.
The station was tested
on many frequencies and modes, including; HF, VHF, UHF, WinLink, VHF/HF
APRS, EchoLink/IRLP/All-Star, email and on-line form. We are pleased that all
of the radio equipment and antennas performed well.
The WX4NHC Test Event is also good practice for Amateur Radio Operators
worldwide, but especially in hurricane prone areas, to test their
station's ability to contact WX4NHC, should they need to during a hurricane.
It was also a good opportunity for NWS Office Staff to become aware of the
unique capabilities of Amateur Radio during severe weather and disaster
communications; when conventional communication modes fail.
WX4NHC was on-the-air
on HF and on digital modes and performing equipment testing and operator
training for 8 hours.
Communications contacts and surface reports were received from many stations
throughout the USA, Canada, and countries in the Caribbean, Central and South
America.
Special thanks to Jean-Robert Galliard HH2JR for his continued support of
WX4NHC.
Also special thanks to Lor Kutchins W3QA for helping us with
Winlink.
The VoIP Hurricane Net on (IRLP node
9219 / EchoLink WX-TALK Conference node 7203) worked perfectly making many
contacts.
The Net was great practice, using the same methods used to collect and send
weather reports to WX4NHC during hurricanes.
We send our sincere THANKS to the VoIP Net Manager Rob Macedo KD1CY, the VoIP
Hurricane Net Controls and all those who checked into the net.
http://www.voipwx.net/
More than 40 D-STAR/D-RATS Surface Weather Reports were received at WX4NHC.
The D-Star/D-RATS net and reporting was coordinated by John Davis WB4QDX.
We are excited of the potential that D-STAR/D-RATS modes can produce hurricane
surface reports in a similar format that is used at WX4NHC. These reports may
some day fill in a very important gap in surface data during a hurricane that
we could not receive on other modes. We thank John WB4QDX for his efforts and
look forward to the participation from D-STAR/D-RATS during hurricanes.
WX4NHC also participated in the
Florida State Hurricane Exercise on the UHF SARnet
http://www.sarnetfl.com making many contacts throughout the state of
Florida and with EOC stations. This is a great mode for WX4NHC to make direct
contacts statewide and with EOC offices, especially if a hurricane makes
landfall in Florida.
SARnet currently has 25 UHF repeaters connected statewide. WX4NHC is fortunate
to have a SARnet UHF Repeater on campus courtesy of John McHugh K4AG.
It was very satisfying to make direct contact with Ted Okada N4HNL (FEMA
Chief Tech Officer) on HF 20 meters.
We were also delighted to make contact with Craig Fugate KK4INZ, Administrator
of FEMA on EchoLink and on Florida Sarnet.
The ARRL Emergency Preparedness Manager Mike Corey KI1U and
HWN Manager Bobby Graves KB5HAV both came in
loud and clear into WX4NHC as well.
Mike, Bobby, Craig and Ted all understand very well how Amateur Radio can help
their communities during and after severe weather and other natural
disasters.
We expressed our thanks to all of them for their strong support of the Amateur
Radio Volunteers and WX4NHC.
We are also thankful
for all of the Skywarn Volunteers nationwide for their continued efforts to
help the NWS and NHC and their communities.
You may never know, but your efforts may someday save someone's life.
WX4NHC is thankful for the ARRL's help in publicizing this event as they have done for many years. www.arrl.org
For more information,
please visit:
www.wx4nhc.org
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Julio Ripoll Architect WD4R
www.wx4nhc.org
Celebrating 35 years at the
www.nhc.noaa.gov
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