Cache County ARES is participating in the state-wide exercise planned for this Thursday, April 20, 2023, and they are inviting all operators to join in - regardless of ARES affiliation. Instead of using an earthquake scenario for the exercise, we will simulate a response to flooding, which is a hazard we could face in Cache County in the coming weeks.
At 6:00 p.m. operators at the County EOC will activate the net for the exercise and will complete a roll call check in beginning with the city or town EOC stations. The frequencies for the county net will be the 146.720 repeater on Mount Logan, as well as the Valley Floor repeater 147.200 for stations not affiliated with a city or town EOC.
After the roll call for city and town stations there will be an opportunity for individual stations to check in, as well as any late arriving EOC stations.
Where it is possible, work with your city or town EOC station or faith based organization to exercise their emergency plans. For example, operators in Newton who would like to participate can check into the Newton EOC net that night using the frequency we are using tonight.
If you do not know if your town has an EOC with specific frequencies assigned, visit the ARES page of the BARC website to review the County EmComm plan where a current list of EOC frequencies is posted. A link to the directory is also available here. If you find your area is not covered by an EOC you can communicate directly with the County EOC.
You are welcome to report incidents that will require action - homes flooding, power outages, evacuations, requests for sandbags, and communicate those requests to your local EOC or faith based organization, and when necessary the EOC or faith based organization can forward those requests to the County EOC. Again, communicate directly to the County EOC if your community does not have an EOC in place.
Whether you participate as part of an EOC, or individually, the County Emergency Manager would like to be informed about the situation at your location, in the form of a response to a series of questions. We will review those questions in a moment.
When you check in to your local net, or the County EOC net as a city or town station, or an individual, and have been acknowledged by net control, you are to advise net control that you will send your situation response via Winlink, or you may give your answer by voice on the net frequency.
If you choose to respond using the Winlink form, there is some advance preparation needed. A modified field situation report form has been prepared by the County EOC personnel and can be downloaded as a .zip file. Get the file here. Also available is a video with instructions to complete the form, here.
Once downloaded and unzipped, save the file in your Winlink template folder using the following path: RMS Express / Your call sign / Templates. Once the file is saved at that location, you will be able to access the file as a template in the new message window of Winlink.
The questions you are to answer are as follows:
Do you have telephone service at your location? Wired, VOIP, Cellular voice and cellular text are the options to declare.
Are you able to monitor AM/FM broadcast radio at your location?
What amateur voice capabilities do you have? 2 meter, 70 centimeter and HF are the choices for this response.
Are utilities functioning at your location? Water, Electricity, and is it stable, as well as natural gas are the utilities to report.
Do you have internet access at your location?
Do you have Winlink capability?
Are you able to communicate over GMRS?
Now, a bit more about how to answer the situation report when you check in.
If you will be responding by voice during your net check in, please shorten your response to indicate what you do not have available at your location. If I was answering the situation report by voice for the Newton EOC, where we do have a wired phone but it is not conveniently located in the EOC, and there is no HF radio on site, once our EOC check in had been acknowledged by net control, I would then say: “All items are functioning except wired telephone and HF, this is N7GRF”.
If the EOC will use Winlink to respond, after our EOC check in has been acknowledged by net control I would follow up with the indication our situation response will be sent by Winlink.
That same process would apply if you are checking into your city or town EOC.
If you are using Winlink to respond to the situation report questions, it is also requested that you send a position report to the County EOC by Winlink, also using a specific form. View the instructions here.
The Newton EOC will be activated for the exercise, and we will open a net from the EOC on the primary frequency we are using tonight. If you would like to check in here, instead of to the county net, please feel free to do so. You are also welcome to send your winlink responses to the Newton EOC using my call sign N7GRF as the recipient.