Huntington Beach RACES

Reminder that The Baker to Vegas team has a mandatory meeting Monday at 6pm in the EOC. We are still in need of some 2nd shift communicators. If you are even thinking about it please join us in the EOC Monday.

Questions please give me a call at my number in the roster.

Margaret

The Tsunami from the Japan earthquake hit Huntington Beach Friday morning. There wasn’t much of a Tsunami. We only saw a couple of feet tidal surge. These photos were taken from the main tower on the HB pier.

Beach Evacuated

View of surf

Traffic post used to monitor surge

Lifeguard Tod

Good surf not a result of the tsumani

The recent storm blanketed the local mountains with snow including the WD6AWP repeater site at Santiago Peak.

Huntington Beach RACES Baker to Vegas Communication Team will provide mobile communications support to the Huntington Beach Police Department Running Team’s participation in the 27th Annual Baker to Vegas Relay Race scheduled for April 16 – 17, 2011.

HB RACES looks forward each year to providing the best communications resource for the Huntington Beach Running Team. We use this event as an opportunity to practice implementing a reliable communications net in a difficult environment and fostering our working relationships with the Huntington Beach Police Department.

HB RACES provides live tracking of the runner’s position via APRS ham radio equipment during the race. The position reports are available via any Internet connected PC at Huntington Beach Runner Position Report. Huntington Beach begins their relay run in Baker, California on Saturday, April 16th and finishes on Sunday, April 17th in Las Vegas, Nevada

HB RACES communicators follow the Huntington Beach runner and are available at the upcoming stages to provide updated position reports and assistance to runners waiting for their leg to start. The stage communicator will have the unofficial leg times for the running team and any special instructions relayed from the team captain.

HB RACES Communicators are available at the Hunting Beach Running Team’s Staging Suite at the Hilton – Las Vegas. Runner status information and unofficial leg times are available. Call the room and ask for the RACES communicator. We can assist you in getting messages to the racecourse runners. Cell phone coverage is spotty along the course, but our ham radio resources provide 100% coverage of the racecourse allowing voice communication to all participants and the follow van.

Plans are being developed to provide radio communication support to the running team. Contact Margret Cerecedes, KE6OAR if you would like to participate in this communication event and be sure to attend the upcoming General Membership Meeting on March 7th, 2011 to learn more.

Web links to learn more:
http://www.bakervegas.com/
http://www.b2v.org/
http://tracking.b2v.org/
http://b2v.findu.com/

The audio from the 2011 Surf City Marathon 2 meter net is at https://files.me.com/tim.sawyer/bwec0e. The net starts about 20 minutes into the recording. My apologies for the slightly slowed down speed of this recording. Everybody sounds like they’ve had one to many drinks.

Here’s the current net control supervisor document.

2011NetSupvJanuary

The membership policy for Huntington Beach RACES has been updated. Please follow this link to view new membership policy.

At the last Officers meeting it was mentioned that RACES RICS Form 40 and 80 were not on the web site. Well here they are. These forms are for Certified Net Control Operators use during drills and activations. Of course this post will eventually scroll off the page but you can use the site search box to find this post and thus these forms at a later date.
RACES RICS Form 40
RACES RICS Form 80

HUNTINGTON BEACH, Calif. – Starting at approximately 12 noon on Sunday September 19, 2010 and continuing for about six hours, volunteers from the Huntington Beach Radio Amateur Civil Emergency Service (RACES), will conduct a yearly drill to demonstrate its ability to provide a backup radio system to dispatch Fire Department resources and maintain communications if the City’s existing two-way radio system fails.

HB RACES Chief Radio Officer Dr. Steve Graboff briefs the volunteer radio operators in preparation for the 9-1-1 drill this coming Sunday, September 19.

Incoming Fire 9-1-1 calls will be handled by RACES communicators and relayed via ham radio to the Fire Operations Center, where the supervising Fire Department officer will assign units to respond to the call. The units will then be dispatched using the ham radio network to the RACES communicators at the stations and riding on the fire apparatus. Status and availability, as well as city-wide tactical communications, will be maintained via RACES Amateur Radio emcomm.

Dr. Steve Graboff, the HB RACES Chief Radio Officer, said, “This is a ‘Shadow’ exercise, in which our group of volunteers work in parallel with the existing radio system. It is important to know this is a practice run, with a simulated shutdown of the existing system. The existing MetroNet system and their operators will continue to receive and dispatch 9-1-1 calls normally.”

In years past, the RACES team has responded with equal or better dispatch times compared to the existing system, and because of this, the fire department has improved their system by modifying dispatch protocol to improve Fire Department response times.

“With communications support from HB RACES, the citizens of Huntington Beach can be assured that the Fire Department will respond to their calls even if the City’s communications systems fail,” Graboff continued.

About Huntington Beach RACES
The Radio Amateur Civil Emergency Service, or RACES (pronounced “RAY-sees”) is an all-volunteer Amateur Radio emergency communications group that is part of the Huntington Beach Fire Department Office of Emergency Services and Homeland Security. RACES communicators provide their own Amateur Radio equipment in support of emergency communications for the City of Huntington Beach.

For more information on HB RACES, go to www.hbraces.org

For further information contact:

Steven R. Graboff, MD
Huntington Beach Fire Department
RACES Chief Radio Officer
ocbonedoc-at-gmail-dot-com

Wayne Yoshida
Huntington Beach Fire Department
RACES Public Information Officer
310-357-4761
kh6kine-at-earthlink-dot-net