The Next meeting of the Dixie Amateur Radio Club will be held on Wednesday, September 21, 2005, under the pavillion at Washington City's Nisson Park. The park is located at approxomately 50 South 200 West.  The park is along Telegraph Street. Below is a map to the location: You may also use this interactive Google Map to chart a course from your present location: http://maps.google.com/maps?q=50+S+200+W,+Washington,+UT+84780&ll=37.131821,-113.516321&spn=0.013944,0.026337&t=h&hl=en We will have a “ham radio swap meet” and informal social between 6:00 P.M. and 7:00 P.M. as well as a Volunteer Exam Session there at 6:00 P.M. (we will put a sign on the door at our original location at the FCAOG office building directing anyone who did not notify us about their intent to test so they can come to the other location). Please don't consider this the typical Ham Fest "bring every component, conector, cable and creation type of swap meet".  Please try to limit it to radios, smaller antennas, receivers, HT's , accessories and the like type of items that you believe local hams would be interested in.  Please bring small tables for your "stuff" if you have them as well a a lawn chair if you desire. Also, if you haven't looked on the "Library" page for the link to DARC member for sale items, "check it out!". (Sorry, a bad pun)!   The ham club “meeting” itself will begin at 7:00 P.M.   We will be having a very informal meeting. We need to discuss the preparations for the St. George Marathon as well as discuss Amateur Radio participation at the uipcoming Huntsman World Senior Games. We will be distributing the orange safety vests ordered by a number of club members. New orders will be accepted for another batch. It takes approximately 2-3 weeks to complete an order. The cost of the vests is $24.00.  They come in 3 sizes:  "Small-Medium",  "Large-XL" and "XXL-XXXL" I will be picking up the Deli sandwiches for the club members that requested them.  We are asking for a donation of $2.00 to offset the cost.  Chips and beverages and cake will be provided  for everyone. At approximately 7:45 PM we will then have a series of ARRL video presentation on the “big screen” entitled:  Disaster Preparedness/Public Service ·  When Disaster Strikes. This program discusses the ever-changing role of Amateur Radio in public safety and service, leading emergency communications into the 21st Century. Produced by ARRL and The Martinez California Police Department. 1996 [10 min] ·  At Any Moment. An overview of Amateur Radio disaster preparedness. An introduction to the Amateur Radio Emergency Service (ARES), RACES, and the National Traffic System (NTS). 1983 [14 min] ·  Disaster Drill: The Big One. Emergency management coordination during an earthquake drill. Includes short pieces about establishing ham radio communications during disasters, voice, packet radio and amateur television. Produced by the Portland (OR) Fire Bureau. 1988 [12 min] So approximately 40 minutes will be devoted to these films. We then will watch the series of videos after which we can have more time devoted to the swap meet and informal get together before people wander off. We hope to see many of the Dixie Amateur Radio Club Members in attendence at the meeting.

Emergency Communications News:

Gordon Shipley and Travis Lofthouse both sent me a link to the following story from the Huntsville Times Newspaper:

Friday, September 16, 2005
By BART BARTHOLOMEW
Special to the Times

Amateur Radio operators set up emergency signal

There I was, minding my own business, when the phone rang Sept. 1, three days after Katrina hit.

"Hi, Bart!" the voice said. "How would you like to get an Amateur Radio team together and provide emergency radio communications for the Mormon Church Humanitarian Services out of Gulfport, Miss.?"

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, to which I belong, promotes preparedness in members to weather a personal or area disaster.

Individual members are instructed to store food and water for personal disasters, and the church administers a vast welfare organization that stores commodities in dozens of Welfare Storehouses across the United States for distribution to the needy. These supplies allow the church to quickly react and to provide the very first humanitarian services at any disaster site.

Ability to communicate during an emergency is one important service.

The Huntsville Alabama Stake, a district of the church, has identified about 75 area church members who are Amateur Radio Operators. This band of volunteers has been preparing for a disaster by participating in weekly radio training nets, practicing to set up field stations by participating in the annual worldwide Amateur Radio Field Day exercises, and accumulating specialized equipment that can enable them to travel into the center of a disaster area and quickly set up efficient radio field stations independent of commercial power.

This telephone from the church's Dallas, Texas, Welfare Storehouse was an opportunity to prove our response capability.

Within 12 hours (early on Sept. 2), a four-man emergency communications team was on the road for Gulfport. Before the sun set that day, a 31-one foot antenna mast was erected with a high-gain dual band (two-meter and 70-centimeter frequency) antenna on top. A G5RV high-frequency (HF) band wire antenna was hung off the side.

A two-meter radio link had been established with the church's Slidell, La., Satellite Storehouse 50 miles west. The next day an HF band radio link had been established with the church's Dallas Welfare Storehouse.

Since the commercial power had been out since Hurricane Katrina had passed through several days earlier, this emergency communications center was powered by a portable power generator.

Over the next four-day period, this hot and sweaty communication team, Tom Runner AI4IR, Marv MaGill KG4UEC, Karl Bartholomew KB4TOV, and R. D. "Bart" Bartholomew KK4AI, teamed up with two young Amateur Radio operators from Albany, Ga., to handle numerous commodity orders to Slidell and Dallas.

In addition, this team provided communications from the Gulfport center of operations to other church buildings along the coast that were dispersing food and water to the local citizens. During these four days a three-day supply of food and water was dispersed to an estimated 6,000 local citizens from this one facility.

A dozen semi-trailer loads of food and water were unloaded into the chapel cultural hall, supplies that were promptly doled out the front door by 30 to 50 local church member volunteers.

It brought tears to the eyes of this band of communicators to see how these local members, who had experienced minor to major temporal losses of their own, would spend 10 or more hours a day organizing, boxing, and dispersing these goods to their neighbors day after day.

The Stake president, the ecclesiastical leader directing these humanitarian activities from multiple church sites between Pascagoula and Slidell, had had damage to his home, his business has been wiped out, plus his wife was being treated for cancer.

These people, once engulfed with this event, all reacted heroically with generosity. These astounding local personalities are all "Forced Heroes"!

The Times welcomes stories of temporary, full-time mission work by volunteers, whether locally or elsewhere, undertaken by faith communities in North Alabama. Please contact Kay Campbell for guidelines for submitting your mission stories. 532-4320 or kayc@htimes.com.

V.E.TESTING

A Volunteer Examiner (VE) test session will be held as advertised on
 Wednesday, September 21, 2005 at 6:00 P.M.
 at the Washington City's Nisson Park:
50 South 200 West
Washington, Utah

  If you are a person desiring to take an Amateur Radio test or a ham wanting to upgrade this month,
or are a Volunteer Examiner who would like to help out, please contact Dan Farwell at 668-2436

map above for directions to the test session



Message From the President:

St. George Marathon/Huntsman World Senior Games:  This is a GREAT BIG THANK YOU to everyone who was willing and able to take a portion of your valuable time on Saturday September 17th to test your VHF equipment to assure its successful use on the Morning of October 1st.

I was pinch hitting for the regular professional net control operators for this annual event and hope you were able to put up with any of faux pas I may have committed. I want to ESPECIALLY thank the ham operator who correctly reminded me that we should check out the ability of everyone to switch to the alternative frequency to test radios from the same location to the other repeater. This important item missed my radar screen completely. Thank you for jumping in with that VERY IMPORTANT suggestion.  It was VERY timely and appreciated.

73,
Gary N7ARE

Please help support the club!

Dues for 2005 are being solicited. Dues are $15.00 per member ($20.00 per family for multiple ham families). Check the Club's membership ROSTER and see if we have you shown as paid.  If you are shown as current or know you haven't paid yet, please make your check payable to "DARC" and bring it to the meeting or mail it to the club address:

Dixie Amateur Radio Club
P.O. Box 422
Santa Clara, UT 84765

DARC IS AN ARRL AFFILIATED CLUB

2005 Board of Directors
President: Gary Zabriskie, N7ARE
Vice President: Dan Hinkle, KD7RSR
Secretary: Hal Whiting, KD7TKP
Treasurer: Leila Horne, KF7HW
Casey Lofthouse, KD7HUS
Dave Owens, K7VNH
Dan Farwell, W8EQA

THERE IS NO BETTER TIME TO JOIN THE ARRL!

It's the only organization that represents hams at the government level. The current resources available to us through the ARRL are astounding. Check out their web site and find out what's going on!    Click HERE for the ARRL website. ARRL Trademark and logo courtesy ARRL

Don't forget the DARC Sunday evening net!

THE SUNDAY NIGHT NET   MEETS AT 8:00 P.M. MST ON THE 146.91 REPEATER

In the event that the 146.91 repeater is not operational we will conduct the Sunday evening net on 145.49.
If none of these repeaters are operational we will conduct the DARC Sunday net on 146.91 Simplex.

HAM CARTOON

Why Ham Radios break down after the warranty expires!

Please send your questions, complaints, newsletter articles, ham gear, money, accolades,
and anything but your troubles to: Gary Zabriskie, N7ARE