Weather History

Congratulations to members of the Azalea Coast Amateur Radio Club for
orchestrating a successful amateur radio contact between the battleship
USS North Carolina and her namesake, docked in Wilmington for a
commissioning ceremony this weekend.  The director of the museum ship
and the Captain of the new attack submarine USS North Carolina made a 2
meter contact yesterday.  The event was covered by WWAY TV and video
can be seen at the link below:

http://www.wwaytv3.com/video/sub_battleship_share_historic_radio_call/04

This is the first known conveyance of radio greetings between two
namesake military vessels since the cold war era. This weekend the
ACARC will be operating a special event station from the radio room of
the battleship North Carolina to celebrate the commissioning of the new
submarine.

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ARRL North Carolina Section
Section Manager: Timothy B. Slay, N4IB
n4ib@arrl.org
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SHELBY HAMFEST MOVING

 The Shelby Amateur Radio Club will hold their 52^nd Annual Shelby Hamfest at Dallas Park in Dallas, NC. The Hamfest was first held at Shelby City Park and began as a one-day event attended by less than 100 people.  The Hamfest eventually outgrew the City Park and moved to Brackett’s Cedar Park in Casar, NC.  In 1979, we outgrew Brackett’s and moved to the Fairgrounds.  We have grown from less than 100 in attendance to 8000 to 12000 over the Labor Day weekend.

Please see     http://www.shelbyhamfest.org

Kitchen Fire

I never realized that a wet dishcloth can be a one size fits all lid to cover a fire in a pan!

This is a dramatic video (30-second, very short) about how to deal with a grease fire in the kitchen. At the Fire Fighting Training school they would demonstrate this with a deep fat fryer set on the fire field. An instructor would don a fire suit and using an 8 oz cup at the end of a10 foot pole toss water onto the grease fire. The results got the attention of the students. The water, being heavier than oil, sinks to the bottom where it instantly becomes superheated. The explosive force of the steam blows the burning oil up and out. On the open field, it became a thirty foot high fireball that resembled a nuclear blast. Inside the confines of a kitchen, the fire ball hits the ceiling and fills the entire room. Also, do not throw sugar or flour on a grease fire. One cup creates the explosive force of two sticks of dynamite. T his is a powerful message----watch the video and don't forget what you see. Tell your whole family about this video. Or better yet, send this to them.

An ARES Update
   Recently I attended a quarterly meeting of a relatively new organization, "Greater Carolinas Voluntary Organizations Active in Disaster" (VOAD).  I was representing Mecklenburg ARES (they think of us as ARRL).  The meeting was held at the Mecklenburg EOC, and was attended by our 'served agencies' as well as other volunteer agencies that contribute to a disaster recovery such as Crisis Assistance Ministries, United Way, Council on Aging, ARRL,  etc. 
   Conducting the meeting was Salvation Army Major Todd Smith. Wayne Broome, Mecklenburg Emergency Manager, described the role of Emergency Management and the Emergency Operation Center in planning for and responding to a disaster.  Rick Schou, Red Cross Disaster Services manager, presented the importance for each family to have a disaster plan.  VOAD and Mr Broome are seeking a larger set of resources and expertise useful in a disaster response (like the Katrina response at the Charlotte Coliseum, but with more preparation).
   Mr Broome encouraged all involved to do the overview classes of the Incident Command System, IS-100, IS-700, and IS-800B.  Our Area-13 ARES is also encouraging IS-200.  These describe the organization and control basis for all operations at our EOC, starting at the local level.  Some of us have already completed these and may remember one part of IS-800B which describes 15 Emergency Support Functions (ESF).  So far in Mecklenburg county we also have ESF 16,17,18, 19, and 20, which include other specific disaster response functions.
    A new task for the Mecklenburg ARES EC (me) is to track completion of these on-line classes by our ARES members.  More served agencies and now also the VOAD agencies, are getting interested in what we do.  We gain more credibility if we already know ‘the drill’ described by the classes before we get into ‘the drill’ conducted from the EOC.  So far about 20 percent of our ARES roster has completed some of the on-line classes.  If you have, and I don’t know about it yet, send me an email or check my list at a meeting.  If you haven’t let me know when you finish one so I can put a star next to your callsign in the Meck ARES roster.  By the way, I’m getting graded on how many stars I can put into our roster.
    73,  WB2NHQ@arrl.net

Sample plan KD4OZI

3rd Friday of every month!
Starting March 21, 2008
5:00pm - until...

Some, North Carolina Popular License Plates

 Military Services:
Disabled Veteran:  9,784
Vietnam Veteran: 6,419
Purple Heart: 4,455 

Hobbies:
Amateur Radio:   3,122
Harley Owners: 915
Scuba: 579

1/14/08

Officials: Ham Radio Operators Are Storm's 'Unsung Heroes'
Thanks Richard (W4LN) for the information.
12/07/07