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Getting to the specifics of what I said, "my route to work". My route to work is about 40 miles, of that about 20 has no or extremely spotty, ham coverage. And also no cell for about 25 miles.
I have never really had much in the way of ham gear with me on Irwin, never been there in a POV, only a gov vehicle, so not sure of the ham coverage on Irwin proper. On the north edge, on Monument land, I know coverage is spotty at best. As for China Lake most of that is covered very well actually. Sure, some of the canyons anyplace on post are bad, and several large valleys are without coverage, but I bet it amounts to less than 20% of the area is without VHF/UHF ham coverage of some type. I guess the biggest hole would be Mojave B North, south Panamint Valley. And even from there you can get into both Vegas and Trona machines if you can find a high point.
You want to find areas of no VHF/UHF coverage start looking in the canyons and such around Panamint Valley, Saline Valley, and parts of Death Valley. Goler Canyon, Anvil Spring Canyon, Coyote Canyon, Fish Canyon, Surprise Canyon, Jail Canyon, the Saint George mine area, Hunter Mountain Pass road area, the west side of Lippincot Pass, Corridor Canyon, Craig Canyon, parts of Jackass Canyon, the lower eastern side of Forgotten Pass, Lee Flat, any one of a hundred canyons to the immediate west of Saline Peak, etc, etc. The actual area of each of these holes is pretty small, until you have to drive out of them to find coverage. While it might only be a 2 to 10 mile hole that can be a 45 minute to an hour from were you start at.
If you are talking about on road or improved road with no coverage look at sections of 178 (such as Poison Canyon) and Trona Cutoff road. Randsburg Wash Road, and the Teagle Wash area. Parts of 178 between Trona and the 190 (however most of that now has cell coverage, it did not just a few years back). 178 from Walker Pass to Weldon, no (or very spotty) cell or VHF/UHF. Parts of 127 north of 15. Fairly large parts of Sierra Way up to 190 (north of Kernville, but not part of the desert area). Large sections of Scottys Castle Road. Large sections of the Ubehebe Crater road, and Racetrack Valley road.
Speaking of coverage, both VHF/UHF, and cell, many people have no real concept of how it has changed over the recent past. As little as 15 years ago I would have been able to name many, many, 20 and 30 mile segments of highway or improved road that had no coverage of any type. Now it is more typically a few miles along isolated areas. Cell coverage especially has exploded, while ham VHF/UHF in these areas has remained about the same, repeaters come and go, but for the most part the good sites were populated years ago. 190 in Panamint was really bad for years, no cell and no VHF/UHF ham coverage for miles and miles, and multiple accidents each year. Two of the accidents I mentioned were along there and before cell coverage was there. Now you can use your cell almost the entire way. My attitudes about communications are probably a bit dated and influenced by these past times, but I am OK with that.
That is one of the reasons these discussions about transmitting out of band in these threads have become less and less valid. What might have applied 20 or 30 years ago, really been valid, just simply is not today. Yeah, you can “what if” and draw a scenario were it might be needed, but you have to work hard at it. A ham has much better chances of winning the Powerball then ever being in a situation that might “require” the use of Public Service frequencies in an emergency. Like I said before, I have the capability myself, but cannot really ever see a reason it might be needed, there is always another way.
T!
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On the “on topic” side, we are discussing real world options to violating regulations for some of the more remote regions of the continental US. People die here pretty often because of lack of communications.
