eHam.net News

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Operation Seismos Brings National Guard to Iron County for Earthquake Drill

Posted: 05 Feb 2016 04:05 PM PST
http://www.eham.net/articles/36119


CEDAR CITY -- A heavy military presence will be felt in Cedar City this
weekend as the Utah National Guard 213th Forward Support Company teams up
with Iron County Emergency Management to conduct "Operation Seismos."
Soldiers in fatigues will have boots on the ground starting Friday as they
step in to evaluate and help improve Iron County's emergency preparedness
capabilities in the event of a large earthquake that could wreak havoc on
the region. The exercise began Wednesday morning with the simulation of a
large earthquake that buckled Interstate 15 in two places, collapsed a fire
station and set a couple of buildings on fire, Emergency Management
Coordinator John Higley said. "It was a significant event as far as an
exercise goes," he said, and lessons have already been learned. "In this
kind of weather we have found that we do have some issues," Higley
said. "The trailer that we set up in is extremely cold and we were not able
to heat the trailer well enough to maintain it, so we've kind of abandoned
that for now until we re-evaluate that and change some things." Wednesday
was spent working with ham radio operators in the area to transmit
emergency messages digitally to access resources for the community, Higley
said. Messages were sent back and forth between ham radio volunteers and
the Emergency Coordination Center, and some of the work being done with the
radio operators is groundbreaking, Higley said. "We are doing things not
done elsewhere in the world as far as communications with our ham radio
operators," Higley said. "We are not just practicing voice communication
but they are transmitting digital communications." Ham radio operators were
filling out forms in their cars out in the field, he said, and then
transmitting the forms back to the Emergency Coordination Center digitally
via email.


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Propagation Forecast Bulletin #6 de K7RA:

Posted: 05 Feb 2016 08:50 AM PST
http://www.eham.net/articles/36118


Over the recent reporting week (January 28 through February 3) both
sunspot and solar flux averages were down a negligible amount, and
geomagnetic numbers were down substantially, compared to the
previous seven days.


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How to Use a Spectrum Analyzer:

Posted: 05 Feb 2016 08:51 AM PST
http://www.eham.net/articles/36117


This video gives an overview of the spectrum
analyzer and details how to use and set up a
spectrum analyzer.