DAREN of WV News January 20, 2013(.A72)
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.
Sammy Mercer, N8SVX, my wide Dot, KC8HAI, and I went to the Jackson County tower site to work on the Jackson County NODE/PBBS of JACKWV/RPLYWV. The station had been off the air since December 7th. When we got to the site we found the radio had been turned off. I don't know why it had been turned off, there is a plug in the speaker jack, so it wasn't making any noise. When we turned the radio back on, the frequency display said the frequency was 145.000 MHz, just like it had just come out of the box. We re-programmed the radio, and changed out the power supply batteries, just to make sure they were okay. When I got the old batteries back home, I tested the two batteries, and one of them tested bad, but the other one tested fine. Oh, well, the station is back up and running. On the way back home from the tower site we stopped by Jackson General Hospital to work on a commercial 800 MHz radio that operates on the JEMNet (Joint Emergency Management Net) system. The radio has been installed for almost two years, and the station only operated a couple of times. We got the radio working for now. I'll see how it is doing when I call up the JEM Net on Friday morning at 9:00am. While we were at the hospital we talked to Tim Harrison, the security/maintenance man about getting his Amateur Radio license. Tim said that he is planning to take the one day Technician Radio class that I would be holding this coming Thursday, January 24th. Tim was looking over the shoulder of Jim Coberly, KD8DMP, while he was operating Packet Radio at the Region 5 Hospital exercise on December 6th. Tim is already talking about getting Amateur Radio and Packet for the hospital.
This week is going to be a busy week for me. On Tuesday I will be going to a Safety Meeting in Pleasants County, then go over to Ritchie County to an LEPC (Local Emergency Planning Committee) meeting at the E-911 Center. On Wednesday I will be going to Roane County to attend an LEPC meeting. Then on Thursday I will be holding a one day Amateur Radio Technician License class at the Mid-Ohio Valley Health Department, Parkersburg.
There were only 45 check-ins to the State Wide DAREN Net this week. John Peterson, K8ZPR, who's been participating the net since April 23, 1994, has completed 950 check-ins, and will be receiving his certificate. Ken Butler, WA8TOX, needs only one more check-in to make 200. And, Ray Hensley, KJ4MWQ, needs only one more check-in to make 50.