************************
MDC Section News
Vol. 12, No. 09
September 13, 2017
************************
* MDC SECTION-WIDE EchoLink® NET FRIDAY SEPTEMBER 15th
* 2017 MDC SECTION EMERGENCY TEST (SET)
* UPCOMING HAMFESTS
* T-MARC MEETING ANNOUNCEMENT AND COORDINATION REPORT
* MDC SECTION ARES® REPORT
* SECTION TRAFFIC MANAGER'S REPORT
* FINAL COMMENTS FROM YOUR SECTION MANAGER
==> MDC SECTION-WIDE EchoLink® NET FRIDAY SEPTEMBER 15th
This month's MDC section-wide EchoLink® net will be held on
Friday, September 15th at 8:00 PM on the EchoLink *WASH_DC*
Node 6154.
The EchoLink net is always held on the third Friday evening of
every month at 8:00 PM local time.
If you would like to join in on RF, the following repeaters and
IRLPs have linked in for EchoLink nets:
- KA2JAI-R operates through the KB3CMA repeater 442.300(+),
CTCSS 107.2 Hz, in Annapolis, MD
- WB3GXW-R, 147.225(+), CTCSS 156.7 Hz, located in Calverton, MD
- N3HF-L, 443.45(+), CTCSS 151.4 Hz, located near Ocean City, MD
- N3HF-R, 443.45(+), CTCSS 156.7 Hz, located near Silver Spring, MD
- W3ICF-R, 146.73(-), CTCSS 141.3 Hz, located near Frederick, MD
- K3CAL-R, 146.985(-), CTCSS 156.7, located near Sunderland, MD
- W3SMR, 147.150 MHz (+), CTCSS 114.8 Hz, Brandywine, MD
- N3RO-L, 145.545, Simplex, Frederick Co, MD
- W3SMD-L, 147.51, Simplex, N. St Mary's County, MD
- K3GMR-R 146.61 (-), No CTCSS, Cheverly, MD
Everyone is encouraged to join in and give any updates on what is
happening in your part of the ARRL Maryland-DC Section.
If you do not have EchoLink on your Computer, Tablet or
Smartphone, you may download the free software from:
http://echolink.org/register_data.jsp or your App Store online.
As always, we thank John Creel, WB3GXW, for making the *WASH_DC*
EchoLink server and his WB3GXW-R repeater available for the
EchoLink nets.
==> 2017 MDC SECTION EMERGENCY TEST (SET)
The 2017 MDC Section Simulated Emergency Test will be Thursday,
October 5 and Saturday October 7. What, you might ask!!
This section applies to all radio operators in the MDC Section.
The Maryland Department of Health has ordered all health
facilities in the State having Amateur radio back up emergency
radio systems to exercise those systems Thursday Night,
October 5 prior to the arrival of Hurricane "Elmer." (This is
actually the Quarterly MDC Section Hospital Drill).
Those supporting the health care facilities having these radios
are asked to contact Wanda Montgomery, MDC ASM for the Section
EmComm Health Care Program. Her email address is:
KA3AHI@aol.com.
Give her your intentions whether playing in the drill or not.
Plan with injects is forthcoming once she knows who has signed up.
If not in a health care facility yet, your operations may be
from the parking lot.
This section of the Notice is targeted to the Eastern Shore
Amateur Radio hams. I have no other option but to use this
media to reach out to you.
For Oct 7, the scenario will be a direct hurricane hit at or near
Ocean City. As the Section Emergency Coordinator, I am having
much difficulty finding a conduit to the Eastern Shore hams,
NOT HAVING AN EC THOSE COUNTIES, to invite and encourage
participation in the SET.
The SET will be an APRS contingent of a fox hunt for a missing
child, MEMA traffic for status awareness, and hospital emails
over Winlink to health departments.
We need radio operators with their equipment and RVs and trailers
for three command posts in the affected area. There is a lot
more to the SET than meets the eye and too long to type.
If you want to know more, contact me, Jim Montgomery, the MDC EC
at wb3kas@arrl.net.
Contact me with your intentions, please, at wb3kas@arrl.net.
I hope to see many of you there to support this year's SET.
73,
Jim Montgomery WB3KAS
MDC Section Emergency Coordinator
==> UPCOMING HAMFESTS
This is a list of hamfests in the Maryland-DC Section area.
I am including hamfests in nearby Pennsylvania, northern Virginia,
West Virginia and Delaware as a courtesy to our neighboring
Section Managers.
I, as your MDC Section Manager, Marty Pittinger, KB3MXM, and/or
a designated ARRL representative(s) plan to attend all hamfests
in the ARRL Maryland-DC Section.
We hope to see you all there.
------------------------------------------
CARA Fest
Date: Sunday, October 1, 2017
Location: Howard County Fairgrounds, 2210 Fairgrounds Road,
West Friendship, MD 21794
Website: http://www.carafest.org
Sponsor: Columbia Amateur Radio Association
Type: ARRL Hamfest
Talk-In: 147.390+ (CTCSS: 156.7)
Public Contact: David Parkison, KB3VDY 1257 Stevens Avenue,
Arbutus, MD 21227
Phone: 410-977-1249
Email: info@carafest.org
-----------------------------------------
Second Annual American Legion PGCERA SantaFest
Date: Saturday, December 9, 2017
Location: American Legion Youth Camp, 9201 Surratts Road,
Cheltenham, MD 20623
Website: pgares.org/santafest/index.html
Sponsor: American Legion and Prince Georges County,
Emergency Repeater Association
Talk-In: 145.230 (CTCSS: 110.9 Hz)
Public Contact: Charles Hallock, AA3WS, 16203 Manning Road,
West Accokeek, MD 20607
Phone: 301-535-1666
E-mail: selbynet@hotmail.com
-----------------------------------------
Delaware State Convention (Delmarva Amateur Radio
& Electronics EXPO)
Saturday, April 21, 2018
Location: Cheer Community Center, 20520 Sand Hill Road,
Georgetown, DE 19947
Website: www.radioelectronicsexpo.com
Sponsor: Sussex Amateur Radio Association
Type: ARRL Convention
Talk-In: 147.090 (CTCSS: 156.7 Hz)
Public Contact: Herb Quick, KF3BT
PO Box 1431
Seaford, DE 19973
Phone: 302-629-4949
-----------------------------------------
Harrisburg Radio Amateurs Club Firecracker Hamfest
Saturday, June 30, 2018
Location: Harrisburg Area Community College
3599 Industrial Road
Harrisburg, PA 17101
Website: http://www.w3uu.org
Sponsor: Harrisburg Radio Amateurs' Club
Type: ARRL Hamfest
Talk-In: 146.76 (CTCSS 100.0 Hz)
Public Contact: Tim Lehman, KB3OZA
PO Box 453
Hummelstown, PA 17036
Phone: 717-461-3398
Email: kb3oza@arrl.net
-----------------------------------------
You may view upcoming Hamfests which are being held in the MDC
Section and nearby in Pennsylvania, Delaware, West Virginia and
northern Virginia area by clicking on either:
http://www.arrl-mdc.net/hamfest.htm or the ARRL's Hamfest and
Convention Calendar at:
http://www.arrl.org/hamfests-and-conventions-calendar.
==> T-MARC MEETING ANNOUNCEMENT AND COORDINATION REPORT
T-MARC is The Mid-Atlantic Repeater Council.
T-MARC coordinates Amateur repeater operations to help keep VHF
and UHF interference problems to a minimum.
T-MARC's areas of responsibility include the District of
Columbia, Delaware, Maryland, Northern Virginia and the eastern
panhandle of West Virginia.
The next T-MARC General Membership meeting will be held at the
Columbia Amateur Radio Association's CARAFest on Sunday,
October 1, 2017 at the Howard County Fairgrounds in West
Friendship, Md. The meeting will start at 10:30 am in the Dining
Hall. More information on the hamfest may be found at:
www.carafest. org
Meeting Agenda:
Welcome
Treasurers Report
Coordination Report
Proposal to utilize 441/446 segments for repeater inputs/outputs
RFinder discussion
TMARC Board Elections
Q&A
Details on the proposed use of 441/446 segments can be found at:
http://www.tmarc.org/index_files/TmarcNews.htm
As many of you may know, last year the ARRL decided to no longer
accept coordinated repeater data from the frequency coordinators.
The ARRL decided to use the "crowd-sourced" data provided by
RFinder (http://www.rfinder.net) and encouraged coordinators to
submit their information to RFinder for inclusion in the ARRL
Repeater Directory.
The TMARC Board of Directors has been working on drafting an
agreement to present to RFinder. Terms in that agreement would
include TMARC to be the sole provider of repeater data and payment
terms for that data. The discussion at the meeting will be to get
an idea from the membership if we should participate in supplying
data to RFinder and if we should pursue securing an agreement.
Earlier this year, we had one board member resign. Per the TMARC
Bylaws, the remaining board members elected Mike Kiron W3DCA to
serve on the board until the next membership meeting.
As such, we are seeking nominations for the TMARC Board. If you or
someone you know would like to serve on the board, please let us
know. Election of the TMARC Board will be held at the October 1st
meeting.
August 2017 Coordination Report
Applications in Process:
Alexandria Radio Club
– Received application for narrow band 440 pair in
Alexandria, Va.
- Still researching a viable pair.
KB3VJO
- Received application for 440 pair in Flintstone, Md.
- Sent Notice of Proposed Coordination to neighboring
coordination groups.
KA3LAO
– Received on air confirmation of 442.4625+ at Woodbine, Md.
- Sent Final Coordination
Other:
South Eastern Repeater Assoc
- Received 2 proposed coordinations for 440
Area Repeater Coordination Council
- Received 2 proposed coordinations for 2M
- Received 3 proposed coordinations for 440
You may view the T-MARC home page at: http://tmarc.org/.
[The above information was provided by T-MARC, The Mid-Atlantic
Repeater Council, www.tmarc.org, who is solely responsible for
its content.]
==> MDC SECTION ARES® REPORT
ARES Monthly Section Emergency Coordinators Report
Very little to no comments in this month's report.
My comments follow:
EmComm Events and Comments from around the Section
de Section Emergency Coordinator WB3KAS:
Reporting
Five of the 18 appointed ECs submitted their monthly ARES County
reports this month, or 28%. Not good. Now, let's get the
remaining county ECs to go get working on theirs.
The new ARRL's fillable pdf reporting system makes it soooooo
easy for me. All I have to do is train you guys in how to fill
them out!! For starters, please change over to the new
system. I had to 'redo' four EC reports this month and it was
time consuming. Second, fill in the right form. You can get the
correct form at:
http://www.arrl.org/files/file/Public%20Service/2017%20Forms/Monthly_DEC-EC_Report.pdf
It's extremely important that your constituents hear what is
going on relative to EmComm in their community. If nothing more,
tell us what meetings you hold, when, where and what
repeaters you can be found on. I'd like to hear from the rest
of you.
All MDC DEC positions (Western, Central and Eastern) are now
filled. Make sure you put them on email copy for all that you
put up to others in performance of your EC duty.
I am actively pursuing a new position for the Eastern DEC and
TALB EC. More to follow.
There are seven counties that do not having an Emergency
Coordinator. They are ALLE, CARO, DORC, KENT, QACO, SOME and
WORC. As you can see 6 out of the 7 are on the Eastern Shore
and is a grave concern from a wx perspective. I say this every
month because this is gravely important this time of year. If
you live in any of these counties, please consider getting
involved with emergency communications and sign up to assist the
hospitals in your area.
Contact me for more information at wb3kas at arrl.net.
SEC Presentations
Wanda, KA3AHI, and I continue to schedule visit to as many ARES
and club groups as possible. We have two presentations I think
would be worth your while to hear. One on Section
Interoperability and the other is the Section Health Care
EmComm Program. If you have interest in this, and have room on
your meeting agenda for us, please contact me.
MDC Section Reflectors
We introduced a new MDC Section reflector, ARRL MDC Section
Winlink Training Group for P2P and Hybrid networks, or MDCQRV
for short. Please make use of this tool to sharpen skills and
fine tune your configuration files. Located at:
https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/MDCQRV/info
The new ARRLMDCSection Yahoo Reflector is now available. If
you are not a member. . .you should be!! We now have 86 members
this month, same as last month. I encourage you to use this to
inform or keep intouch with the rest of your fellow members.
With the wide distribution of this newsletter coming out only
once a month, this Yahoo Site with keep you up to date with late
breaking news, including a possible disaster call up. There is
very little traffic to clog your in box. You can join at:
https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/ARRLMDCSECTION/info.
Meetings
The 2017 SET Planning meeting was held Sep 9 in preparation for
the October 7 SET on the Eastern Shore. It was well attended by
31 die-hards interested in seeing this SET to succeed. This
will be an all day deployment Exercise. If interested drop me
a line.
Future Events:
Fourth and Final 2017 Quarterly Hospital Drill on October 5.
KA3AHI is planning on this being a Section Wide event for those
who operate in a hospital or health care facility. If you are
currently in a health facility with radios (and we might not
have the latest count) please contact her (ka3ahi at aol dot com)
with updates soon so injects may be properly introduced.
Total number of ARES members: 472
Number of DECs/ECs reporting this month: 5(28%)
Number of ARES nets active: 14
Number of nets with NTS liaison: 4
Calls of DECs/EC reporting: N3SEO, KB3LJB, WB3KAS, NI2W
Number of exercises & training sessions this month: 17
Person hours: 153
Number of public service events this month: 4
Person hours: 265
Number of emergency operations this month: 1
Person hours: 45
Number of SKYWARN operations this month: 0
Person hours: 0
Tnx es 73, de
Jim
WB3KAS
PRGE ARES EC
MDC SEC
==> SECTION TRAFFIC MANAGER'S REPORT
For August, 2017
MDC NTS NETS:
MEPN 1708 W3YVQ QND/31 QNI/444 QTC/60 MINS/758
BTN 1708 AB3WG QND/31 QNI/490 QTC/49 MINS/669
MDD 1708 AA3SB QND/61 QNI/332 QTC/116 MINS/629
MSN 1708 W8CPG QND/30 QNI/132 QTC/32 MINS/547
PSHR: KK3F 150, W3YVQ 135, K3IN 110, AA3SB 100,
WB3FTQ 95, N3ZOC 90, AB3WG 87, W3CB 82, NI2W 76;
TFC: KK3F 1880, K3IN 163, WB3FTQ 113, AA3SB 103,
N3ZOC 79, W3YVQ 72, AB3WG 37, NI2W 16, W3CB 2
==========
HF PROPAGATION
HF NVIS propagation on MEPN (3820 KHz) was totally
functional throughout August, 2017; weak signals at
1730L but improving at 1800L due to the lowering sun
angle. The summer influence of longer days has
compensated to some degree for the periods of lower
solar activity. The evening Cycle 4 nets had improving
conditions for the month for the MDD 1900L session
but with some nights with poor conditions at 2200L EDT.
MDC RADIOGRAMS AND OTHER MESSAGING
Outlets in each ARES® jurisdiction are needed for daily
Radiogram and Radio-email traffic for served agencies,
and also for messaging welcoming new hams to the
Amateur Service. Join the MEPN, BTN, or MDD nets
daily to find out more about how to contribute.
BTN LOCAL NTS TRAFFIC AND TRAINING NET
The BTN continues to meet on 145.33/R (no tone) daily
at 6:30PM local time and continues to welcome new
amateurs. The availability of an active directed traffic
net of the NTS on VHF is exactly why the BTN was
established, providing a welcoming place for
newcomers to the Amateur Service. Thanks to all the
BTN stations checking into the MEPN via Echolink.
MEPN ECHOLINK
MEPN representatives check for Echolink check-ins
starting at net call daily via the WB3GXW-L link node
(or *WASH_DC* conference node backup if the -L
node is not available). A number of BTN and MEPN
members, as well as stations outside the area, have
used Echolink to check in when HF is not available to
them. Thanks to all.
MSN CW TRAINING
Remember that the MSN provides CW training daily
for newcomers to the mode, or those wishing to
refresh their skills, daily at 7:30 PM on 3563 kHz.
Each trainee works with an assigned instructor off
the net frequency to receive radiograms containing
training information. Instructors work with each
student at their own desired speed and check-in
schedule. All are encouraged to master the art of
CW via this net or personal training in order to
support and join the ranks of our MDD Section
CW net. Robin, AA3SB, MDD NM, and the veteran
staff, will be glad to help you advance to the
evening CW full Cycle 4 of the NTS.
---
Thanks to all the Section traffic net NCS stations,
DTN/RRI and WL2K stations, liaisons, and traffic
handlers for the continuing effort to keep the nets
running and traffic moving.
Thank you for your continued support of MDC integrated
ARES and NTS operations.
73, W3YVQ, MDC ASM, STM
w3yvq atsign arrl dot net
w3yvq atsign winlink dot org from WL2K
==> FINAL COMMENTS FROM YOUR SECTION MANAGER
Greetings,
After returning from an utterly massive disaster in Texas and
Louisiana, I am exhausted.
But I am back on the job and ready for the next maelstrom. Please
note that the MDC Section is already preparing.
Many thanks for your support –
Marty KB3MXM
73 and remember that I am always ready to serve you.
Marty Pittinger, KB3MXM
KB3MXM@ARRL.org
ARRL Maryland-DC Section Manager
=========================================================
The "Maryland-DC Section News" is published monthly by the
ARRL Maryland-DC Section Manager Marty Pittinger, KB3MXM,
4 Pegram Rd, Owings Mills, MD 21117-2116; tel 443-326-1783.
You may also send an email to: KB3MXM@ARRL.org.
The "Maryland-DC Section News" offers a monthly digest of
essential and general news of interest to all amateur radio
operators.
Please visit the MDC Section web page, www.arrl-mdc.net and
the "ARRL MDC Section News and Alerts" web page,
http://www.arrl.org/sections/view/maryland-dc, for the latest
MDC Section news, links and updates.
My editor is MDC Assistant Section Manager Al Brown, KZ3AB.
Material from the "MDC Section News" may be republished or
reproduced, in whole or in part in any form, without
additional permission.
Please give credit to the "Maryland-DC Section News" or the
original author of submission.
The American Radio Relay League, ARRL, is the national
association for amateur radio.
