After Action Brief Summary – Operation Noah, Held October 6, 2012
OVERVIEW:
Based on reporting stations and agencies, many more things went right than what went wrong. The main objective in an operation of this type is to insure that the messages get through with accuracy. Developed traffic was less than in some previous drills that we have conducted from our area. This traffic load was very realistic for an event of this type. In real events, when traffic handling is your assignment, there are periods of light traffic and times when handling the volume is a challenge. Radio operators were able to take this ebe and flow of traffic in stride and care for messages that required the passing of messages given to them. There were radio operators from 17 assigned locations. There were 51 radio operators that signed up to participate in the drill. There may have been operators that didn't get registered and there were others that signed up but didn't participate. So, we ended up with about 50 active operators. All of us learned from our experience from being part of this training. The following is a breakdown of reflections of participants by category.
WINLINK:
Winlink was more effective in this exercise as compared to previous exercises due to no gateways being overwhelmed with traffic volume. There were Winlink operators working their first exercise but they were teamed with more senior operators and they handled their task without any major problems.
One station was able to work Winlink through 3 different gateways which gave excellent redundancy. Winmor was less effective. It took one station 2 hours to find an HF gateway to allow good throughput. Using this Winmor gateway allowed the exchange of all traffic in short order after finding a workable gateway.
REPEATER OPERATION:
Even though there was no alternate net control appointed prior to the exercise, when net controls needed relief, alternate net controls quickly steeped up to the task. One repeater developed an intermittent problem with a fuse. The net was quickly shifted to an alternate repeater. An automated repeater system brought up an IRLP reflector on schedule. The net control for the SET moved the net to another repeater and continued with the net without problems. Some public service stations had an old, out-of-date offset programmed into their radios. This created a situation where those stations were able to receive but not transmit on that repeater. These rigs are now being reprogrammed. The net was shifted to a repeater that provided coverage on frequencies that provided a connection to all operators.
VARIOUS GROUPS:
In addition to the traditional emcomm groups such as AREA and RACES we had participation from the Virginia Baptist Relief, Southbears, the Virginia Defense Force and Skywarn. The Virginia Baptist operated from their comm trailer in Newport News Virginia. The Virginia Defense Force operated from Lynchburg and Big Walker Mountain and Skywarn operated from the National Weather Service office and observers operated from the field and worked through the primary Skywarn repeater and the N4VL repeater. Nearly half of the traffic was passed through the Skywarn system. All groups were integrated into the overall exercise and passed traffic to the various operators without major problems.
HF OPERATIONS:
The HF operations used a net control from a central location in Franklin County and we had decent propagation on 75 meters throughout most of the exercise. The western part of the state reported excellent passing of traffic on HF. In the eastern side of the state, there was a local exercise being held in addition to Operation Noah. There appeared to be some confusion on the HF net out east, due partly to this dual operation.
STATISTICAL INFORMATION:
We received reports from 10 stations and these reports reflect that 398 messages were sent or received. This traffic was passed using various modes such as VHF and HF voice, and Winlink.
Thanks to all those hams that gave of their time to participate in the exercise. Thanks also to agencies that supported the exercise in various ways. We also appreciate all the repeater owners that allowed their system to be used to support this exercise.
Glen Sage, W4GHS
