ProWords for Ham Radio

Ham radio ProWords are very useful for exchanging information in a quick and efficient way. Unfortunately there are variations such as with the ProWord "BREAK". In most of northern Utah, BREAK means that there will be a pause in your transmission followed by more information. In southern Utah (starting in Provo) "BREAK" means "EMERGENCY". In some other states, "BREAK, BREAK" means emergency and if a few places the emergency call is "BREAK, BREAK, BREAK". In Provo, using "break" to mean that you want to join the conversation will get you chewed out for making a fake emergency call. I don't know why we don't just all standardize on "EMERGENCY" to mean "emergency" and get rid of the confusion.

On repeaters, if you are available for a conversation (QSO) then you simply say "This Is" followed by your call sign followed by "MONITORING" or "LISTENING". On HF we call "CQ" three or more times followed by our call sign in order to stretch out the information so as to have a better chance of being heard by someone who is turning the tuning control looking for a CQ call. On a repeater, you are on a fixed frequency and there are either people on that frequency or not. No long drawn out call is needed to get their attention, hence the much shorter "MONITORING" or "LISTENING".

There are other ProWords that are peculiar to SKYWARN, SAR (Search And Rescue), CAP (Civil Air Patrol) and the Salvation Army net known as SATERN. You can find all of these using Google.

For a treat not even related to ham radio, check out the very last URL link given below. Also, be sure to check out HAM RADIO ON YOUR PC, by HamSphere, which is the next to last URL link given.

Q Codes
http://www.qsl.net/w5www/qcode.html

Ashland CERT ProWords
http://sites.google.com/site/ashlandcert/Home/ham-radio-communications/prowords

Wake County ARES - Standardized ProWords
http://www.wakeares.org/?page_id=38

WikiPedia - Procedure Word
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Procedure_word

WikiPedia 10 Codes
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ten-code

Ten-codes are generally avoided in services such as amateur radio where other existing standards (Q code and prosigns for Morse code) are already long established. Aviation and marine radio is better served by Q-codes, as the ten-code phrase lists were designed primarily for local police tasks while Q-code provides specific abbreviations for concepts related to aviation, shipping, RTTY, radiotelegraph and amateur radio. In radiotelegraph operation, a Q code is often shorter (as ten-codes require transmission of three prefix characters: 1, 0, hyphen) and provides standardization of codes, essential in international and shortwave communication.

Wikipedia - Prosigns for Morse code
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosigns_for_Morse_code

Wikipedia - Morse code mnemonics
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morse_code_mnemonics
Scroll down and see the morse chart (Visual Mnemonic), it is the most original morse chart I have EVER seen.

Lots of general and useful ham radio information
http://www.oharts.org/

THE SALVATION ARMY TEAM EMERGENCY RADIO NETWORK - SATERN
http://www.satern.org/ecom.html
http://www.satern.org/

Another ProWord List
http://www.qsl.net/k/kf4uel//lingo.htm

Ham Radio in your PC
http://www.hamsphere.com/?gclid=CJDd7urRiKQCFRhaiAodejOjHw

And now for something completely different
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39100951/displaymode/1247/?beginSlide=1

73 de N7OZH until next time.

Oct to Dec - SET Drills!

SERVICE PROJECT

SEP 18TH SERVICE ACTIVITY - MULTIPLE LOCATIONS - HAMS NEEDED
Contact Eugene at 801-541-1871 or N7OVT@ARRL.NET
0800 PARKVIEW ELEMENTARY - 15 different areas (locations) of service - hams needed for all. Free continental breakfast before and free lunch after!
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There are lots of local and national SET (Simulated Emergency Test) drills coming up. Quoting from the latest issue of QST - The 2010 ARRL SET is just around the corner. October 2-3 is the focal point weekend but RACES, ARES and other local nets can conduct their drills anytime September through December. Contact your ARRL section manager for more details (www.arrl.org/sections/). Or, click HERE.

ERC is doing a SET drill on November 6th on 147.56 Simplex. Any repeater traffic that they need to pass will be on the MARA 146.74 repeater. More info will follow. MARA has been invited to participate in this drill with ERC, and it is a great learning oppportunity. This is ERCs entry in the Utah State SET drill.
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The state of Utah is doing a Mega-SET drill this year. More info can be found at www.utahset2010.org. This one is an everything-at-once scenario. A record breaking snow storm all over the state of Utah with accumulations up to 65 inches in the higher elevations plus 4 earthquakes. The one at Antelope Island will cause 6 foot waves that will leave downtown SLC in water two feet deep. All power lines and phone lines will be down. The power outages will trigger failsafe devices that will knock out power in all surrounding states, so we get no outside help.

The state would like ALL ham radio operators to participate. All local groups are asked to communicate on all their regular and alternate frequencies. The state will try to contact all counties and all relief organizations and each county will be trying to contact all their local relief agencies plus other counties plus the state.

They want to see how the system handles a major overload. One really original part of the scenario is that organizations and individuals with generators are to assume that the only fuel they will get is what they have on hand. The roads are so torn up that fuel trucks cannot get through. They also assume that every single overpass is down and that I-15 and I-80 are closed all over the state. Of course, they will also toss in some additional challenges that are not in the documentation.

This is going to be FUN! Please go to the web site and download the forms and plan to participate.

One other thing about the forms, they are excellent for your use in an actual emergency. Both the message forms as well as the details for the Post Incident Review.

If you know of other drills, please let us know so that we can monitor them or even participate if there are openings for hams from "outside" the group.

We can all learn from these drills and we can all improve our operating techniques and procedures and readiness. Hope to see you there!
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MARA will have an exercise on Nov 6th as part of the State SET drill. Our participation will be timed to NOT conflict with the ERC net that day.
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For additional info, visit the DCARC web page at http://www.dcarc.net/go/ or just click HERE.
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DCARC CLUB SWAP MEET- Saturday 9/18/10

This is the DCARC Annual Swap Meet on September 18th at 8:00 am till 10 am. We are inviting UARC and OARC to join with us. This year it will be at the Bountiful City Park (same place as last year) which is at 100 West and 400 North in Bountiful. You can find it on Google Maps by clicking HERE.
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The annual ARES/RACES Conference will be held on Saturday, November 13th, 2010, 8:00 am to 4:00 pm. This will be held at the Red Lion Hotel in Salt Lake City. This is a great opportunity to receive training and also meet with fellow communication specialists from across the state.

You do need to pre-register for the conference. In order to do this you will need to utilize the U-Train system which is found at https://www.utah.train.org. Once at the website, the first thing you need to do is set up an account in U-Train as a new user (if you have not already done so previously). Once your U-Train account registration is completed you will then proceed to log in and then either do a course search for the keyword(s) ARES or RACES or on the right side of the home page key in the actual course number, which is 1011069 for the ARES/RACES Conference. Once you have the course listed on the screen, click on that to bring you to the registration/information page and click on the registration tab to register. The system will indicate that your request has been submitted and has to be approved. U-Train notifies the State Training Staff and they will acknowledge by email that you are signed up for the ARES/RACES Conference.

-N7OZH-