One thing hams, as well as police, fire, military, government, and EMS personnel find useful while communicating during an incident is the use of tactical call signs. It's not the same as your FCC-issued call sign, and does not replace it, but can be used as a shortcut or abbreviation during an exercise or emergency.
During an actual call-out it can get really tedious, if not confusing and frustrating, for all parties involved, if you had to remember or read back a series of call signs, possibly fumbling with unfamiliar call signs as you try to transmit important information through the net.
When used properly, tactical calls can prevent confusion and will increase the efficiency and speed in identifying a specific function or person.
Tactical Call Signs are generally assigned by the Net Control Station, and should represent a group name, function, or geographical location. For example: A station identifying as "Newton EOC” or “Logan Regional” is immediately known as to where and what they are by everyone on the net.
For an operator who is not at a fixed location, the tactical call sign assigned should denote the function, or role they are assigned to, such as “Search Team 1”, or “Medic Team 1”, etc.
To expedite traffic, stations on the net can simply use the tactical call sign assigned to the location or role they want to contact without worrying about remembering the FCC call sign of the operator at the location or assigned to the role. This is especially efficient during lengthy incidents where amateur operators fulfilling an assignment have changed after their shift.
Here in the Newton EOC I found the operator shift log from the EOC activation related to Y2K, where several operators manned the EOC in case the fears of telephone communication system failures were realized. With operators rotating out at intervals, an operator switch at the end of a shift could cause a delay in passing traffic if net control had missed the change and continued to call for Newton using just the previous operator's call sign.
Note: It is not necessary to include your amateur call sign after each time you reply with your assigned tactical call sign, but it is necessary to comply with station identification requirements as read in Part 97 of the FCC regulations. Here is an example of tactical call signs in use while adhering to station identification requirements:
Net Control: "Search Team 1, this is Net Control";
Search Team 1: "Go ahead, Net Control";
Net Control transmits the message and Search Team 1 acknowledges. If there are questions or clarification needed, the conversation continues. At the end of the conversation, and every 10 minutes during a longer conversation, each station identifies with their FCC call sign after the tactical call sign:
Net Control, at the end of the conversation: "Net Control, KC7JOO".
On Saturday August 28, 2021 there are two events in the valley where the Bridgerland Amateur Radio Club will help provide communications over the Mount Logan Repeater System. This would be a good opportunity to monitor the 146.720 and 449.625 repeater outputs to hear how tactical calls signs are put to use.