DAREN of WV News April 15, 2012(.A32)
WA8LLM (304) 679-3470 wa8llm@yahoo.com
WOOD COUNTY EMERGENCY COMMUNICATIONS
P.O. BOX 3328, PARKERSBURG, WV 26103
http://www.wc8ec.org
DAREN News, are articles and information about the Digital Amateur Radio "Emergency" Network of WV, which operates on 145.69 MHz. Anyone having any information about DAREN, or Amateur Radio in general, and would like to share it with others, may send it to WA8LLM @ PKBGWV on 145.69 MHz, or to my E-Mail: wa8llm@yahoo.com. A State Wide DAREN NET is operated every Saturday from 7:00 pm to 10:00 pm, and lately, before and after those hours. The DAREN Net Announcement, showing the MAIN NCS, ALTERNATE NCS, NODEs accessible to both, and the previous week's check-ins, are posted by Thursday on most of the Main county DAREN PBBS'. The DAREN News can also be found on the wc8ec.org website.
Jim Stephenson, WV8JS, has been trying to find out who might be able to get the Kanawha County DAREN NODE/PBBS of KANAWV/CHASWV back on the air. It's been 19 years since I went to Charleston and installed the station. At that time the tower site was owned by the state of WV Medical Services. Since then I lost contact with the people who allowed us to install the station. A few years ago the power supply went bad and another one was purchased. Mac McMillian, W8XF, changed out the power supply, and the station has been working good until a couple of months ago when it went off the air. Jim has been talking to Mac and found out the tower WV Medical Services site was abandoned. Mac said that he was able to rescue the DAREN station, and he has it at his house. The only thing he couldn't get from the tower site was the antenna and transmission line. Mac said that if had and antenna he might be able to install the station at the same location as the Kanawha Amateur Radio Club (KARC) voice repeater. Jim says the KARC repeater is located on a tower owned by the City of Charleston, and he knows who to contact. Jim will be working with the city of Charleston hoping to get access to the tower site. If all goes well, I'm going to get an antenna down to Jim and Mac so they can get the station back in operation.
There were 53 check-ins to the State Wide DAREN Net this week. I finally got started on printing up the certificates that I got behind on. I haven't got them all done yet, but it won't be long. Maybe this week I'll be able to get them mailed out.