TO: ALL WOOD COUNTY ARES MEMBERS (OFFICIAL)
ALL ARES AND NON-ARES AMATEURS ANYWHERE (INFORMATION)
FROM: KEN HARRIS WA8LLM ARRL DISTRICT 3 EMERGENCY COORDINATOR
WOOD COUNTY EMERGENCY COMMUNICATIONS INC.
WOOD COUNTY BULLETIN NR 16.25 DATE: June 19, 2016
SUBJECT: FIELD DAY IS FOR LEARNING
Field Day is only one week away. As with all the Field Days in the past, this one will be no exception. Take advantage of every lesson that you can learn when the time comes to taking to the hills and leaving the comforts of home by participating in Field Day. Take advantage of any new experiments that may be tried and ways of installing temporary antennas for use under emergency circumstances.
Because the Field Day antennas are installed in a different way from time-to-time, there may be different, and better, ways used to anchor them to the ground. A lot of our Field Day antennas are inverted "V" antennas, but we will also use "Loop" antennas. As with all of our antennas, the Loop antennas will only be 20 feet high, but it has been proven to be high enough. To secure the ends of the Inverted "V" antennas, rubber stretchy straps can be used. Instead of tying a nylon rope onto the end of the antenna, stretchy straps can be clipped on and secured to ground anchors, or other secure locations. If the wind would blow, the antennas would be able to give and take and not be kept tight which could cause them to break.
When participating in activities such as Field Days, disaster drills, providing safety communications, or any other activity that might be out of the ordinary, take advantage and learn something new from it, it may come in handy sometime in the future when you are providing actual emergency communications for someone else.
Ken Harris WA8LLM
District 3 ARES District Emergency Coordinator
WCEC
Wood County WV