Twin County Amateur Radio Emergency Service

Simulated Emergency Test (S.E.T.) 2003

On October 4th, 2003 the Twin County A.R.E.S. (Amateur Radio Emergency Service) organization participate in a major Simulated Disaster. This simulation used a scenario, of a hurricane, named "X-Ray". The weather product used was similar to Hurricane Camille that devastated Nelson County Virginia in 1969. The National Weather Service office in Blacksburg prepared a script based on a rainfall of 20" over the upper New River basin.

The exercise was opened with a SKYWARN net, at 9:00 a.m. on October 4th. This net continued for two hours. Ham Radio operators from the Blacksburg and Dublin area as well as two operators from the Twin Counties manned a ham station at the NWS office in Blacksburg Virginia. Two ham stations are set up at the Blacksburg Office on a permanent basis and are used to collect vital weather information directly from affected areas during severe weather. With the preinstalled radios, if made for a quick setup at the NWS office. During half of this SKYWARN session, emergency power (no commercial power) was used by participating hams. Only VHF repeaters using emergency power were used during this part of the exercise.

While in session, SKYWARN received 29 weather related and damage reports from the affected area.

At 11:00 a.m. A.R.E.S./R.A.C.E.S. went into operation. This involved ham radio operators from Grayson, Carroll, Galax and a number of counties outside the Twin Counties. This included A.R.E.S. groups from Wythe, Pulaski, Montgomery, Giles, Roanoke, and the City of Richmond. We also had one operator travel from WV to assist. At the point of A.R.E.S. activation, there was no commercial power or phone service in the Twin Counties. Therefore the E-911 center, rescue, fire, and hospitals would have to rely on radio if they had the emergency power that would allow their radios to remain on the air. The Amateur Radio Emergency Service is designed as a communications backup for all these agencies and most volunteer organizations that are active in time of disaster. This simulated disaster also feathered a group of "lost hikers" on the AT in the Grayson Highlands, this is an area that has special challenges to communications systems when there is no crisis.

Our hams were dispatched to a number of key areas in Twin Counties. We had communications teams that went and set up base stations at the following rescue squads, Cana, Rugby, Hillsville, Mount Rogers, Elk Creek, Laurel Fork. These assignments represented a large spread in geography and terrain. Elevation varied from over 5000 feet to 1200 feet above sea level and distance was from the boarder of Grayson and Washington County to the boarder of Carroll and Floyd to the boarder of Carroll and Surrey NC.

In addition to ham radio teams setting up base stations there were other teams that served as field units that in some cases accompanied rescue squad search teams, and in other cases the hams were the search team due to a lack of rescue personnel.

The visiting A.R.E.S. teams had stations set up in their "home counties" to provide communications and help locate needed resources. In all cases other than at the National Weather Service, hams had to bring their own equipment and install their own antennas after arriving on site. This caused the teams to lose some valuable time when life and property would have been at risk.

The A.R.E.S. teams not only covered rescue squads but also set up stations to support other helping agencies. These included Twin County E-911, the Galax Red Cross Office, the Smythe County Red Cross office, a Red Cross Shelter at Mount Rogers, the Red Cross Regional Blood Bank in Roanoke (The Roanoke office has a permanent ham station, consisting of H.F., V.H.F. and U.H,F. radio and packet radio). The Richmond Virginia A.R.E.S. Emergency Coordinator manned the Richmond E.O.C. located below ground at the Virginia State Police headquarters.

(The State E.O.C. has a permanent ham station located at the center.)

When simulated conditions worsened in the Twin Counties, a request was sent to the Virginia State E.O.C. for a "simulated disaster" declaration on 7.243 MHz and this was granted and the confirmation was back at the Twin County E-911 Center within 5 minutes of the request.

During this exercise, 46 ham radio operators were directly involved in the drill. Over 300 messages requesting medical supplies, other equipment and information for the rescue squads, shelters and agencies were passed by the ham operators. Request from outside the area flowed into the Twin Counties requesting "health and welfare" information on residents of our area. The request came by way of voice and digital (packet) radio communication.

Throughout the exercise communication was maintained by ham radio, without failure, between all locations from Richmond, Roanoke, Blacksburg, Wytheville, Marion, Hillsville, Galax and the various remote locations in the Twin Counties. Teams were also out in the field, confirming the welfare of those being sought by relatives. The Packet Node (digital node) on Point Lookout Mountain had its "brain scrambled" for a few hours but we shifted the traffic to voice modes and all messages were delivered without fail.

This Simulated Emergency Test served as a vehicle for testing our ability to communicate during difficult times. It allowed us to work with hams from many different A.R.E.S. groups, different agencies and other volunteer groups. I would hope that in our next S.E.T. that we can broaden our participation.

Glen Sage, W4GHS