dbestfirefighter
Dozer
Just a quick poll of how many hams out there on R.R. that would like to get a storm spotter group for the Oklahoma county area started?
Oklahoma county storm spotter group
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dbestfirefighter
Dozer
Believe it or not no! There is no organized group that covers the Oklahoma city metro area. There is Oklahoma county EM, but the only meet like once a year and from what i listening to they are more concerned with damage assesment than spotting. Plus you have to be in EM to spot. As for Oklahoma City EM, they think that the patrol officers are more than qualifed to spot storms.
highrider8433
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Have you ever listened to 151.445 during the sping that is the Oklahoma County cilvil defense channel. As far as sky warn gos I think that is already a sky warn group in Oklahoma County.
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The central Oklahoma ARES group/OCAPA runs a weather net on 146.820- ...you may want to check out their Thursday evening ARES net and ask for more information.
peterjmag
Member
I wish we had it like OKC here in Tulsa. Every storm year we have to hear some local idiot get on our local storm spotter frequencies and say, "hey I got a little lighning and thunder and some rain over here" or there is a tornadic storm moving in and you here" Hey I just got out of work or school and saw some dark clouds moving in what's goin on?" another words, it must be nice to have people on the Oklahoma County EMA who knows what they are doing. As for Tulsa locals, people listen to the radio or watch TV before you get on the 146.88 or 146.94 and make a fool of yourself. In the process you tie up the air and waste the net controllers time, as well as put other spotters in danger from your obvious and usless reports. Urrhh it anoys me!
P.J. Maguire
P.J. Maguire
CommShrek
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dbestfirefighter said:
Some of the best advice has been already given. Checking into a local net ARES/RACES if you have that in your area would be good. Do you belong to one of the HAM clubs in the OKC area? That's a good place to get started doing a little public service. If you use thier repeaters at all you should strongly consider joining a club to help keep them operational.
You said there is no SKYWARN in OKC? Contact www.okarkskywarn.org and see if some of the people there can point you in the right direction. I'm sure there is something in the OKC area.
Also, if you have to be involved with Emergency Management to spot, why not check into what it takes to be involved. Sounds like you may have already done that though. Maybe the patrol officers are qualified to spot storms. It doesn't take that much training to know what to look for. They are already out on the streets so there is no need to mobilize them. Sounds like you have some other ideas, lets hear them.
K5MAR
Member
mapexdrum said:
Only 10?
Surely you can do better than that! :lol: Mark S.
okcetech
Member
If I am not correct doesn't Skywarn have classes each year and have a statewide repeater network? What more do they have in Tulsa?
dbestfirefighter
Dozer
Yea Ive checked out EM (to much politics),but I have been approached by a number of Hams that would like to get a spotter net started. Possibly have the net control at a tv station? FAST2OKC you have any input (being the one of the founding fathers of stormchasing)...lol?And to answer questions about Skywarn I believe that is a great club, but there isnt a branch located in OKC thats active. Some of the hams Ive chatted with are control operaters of a couple of the best repeaters in the city (some having a 60 mile radius). Sorry to chat away. Just wanted to get some input and maybe start a very active spotter group for the city. Thanks everyone for the input........
N5TWB
Member
Back in the early 90's, when I first became a ham, the Oklahoma City AutoPatch Association (OCAPA) did have a spotter network organized that had KWTV - 9 as its control station because the club had its repeater on the station's tower. From my understanding in talking with club officers, two things have since happened: the station became concerned about liability of non-employees being out in storms to provide them information and they had the repeater taken off of that tower due to the need to mount digital TV equipment. Additionally, weather coverage became an even bigger factor in the ratings wars so the stations decided to have dedicated personnel for this purpose -- witness Val Kastor at channel nine and FAST2OKC as prime examples.
PJ Maguire also posted another problem with most ham weather nets and that is a lack of net discipline, otherwise known as the "blue sky report". This occurs when some hams are in the weather with real reports and others that are not affected by the event feel the need to chime in that they are under "blue skies". Let's face it, the reason we like radio is because we like to talk and it is tough to stifle that urge unless net discipline is rule #1.
In my opinion, your idea is not a bad idea but it does need some refinement. One area of refinement would be to be properly integrated with the SKYWARN net. Please refer to this webpage for how to do that: http://www.srh.noaa.gov/oun/skywarn/ Basically, you need an agreement with an established repeater for the use of that facility, strong net control procedures (that are practiced!), an ability to provide the information to the SKYWARN net that is separate from your primary operations frequency as well as monitor the SKYWARN updates to pass the information to the field for the safety of the spotters. Add to this list required training for your spotter network on the established radio procedures, weather observation reports desired by SKYWARN (wind, hail, wall cloud, etc.), operational areas for spotting, etc.
Sorry for being a little wordy here but you were looking for opinions. This is just mine and it is worth every penny you paid for it ...
PJ Maguire also posted another problem with most ham weather nets and that is a lack of net discipline, otherwise known as the "blue sky report". This occurs when some hams are in the weather with real reports and others that are not affected by the event feel the need to chime in that they are under "blue skies". Let's face it, the reason we like radio is because we like to talk and it is tough to stifle that urge unless net discipline is rule #1.
In my opinion, your idea is not a bad idea but it does need some refinement. One area of refinement would be to be properly integrated with the SKYWARN net. Please refer to this webpage for how to do that: http://www.srh.noaa.gov/oun/skywarn/ Basically, you need an agreement with an established repeater for the use of that facility, strong net control procedures (that are practiced!), an ability to provide the information to the SKYWARN net that is separate from your primary operations frequency as well as monitor the SKYWARN updates to pass the information to the field for the safety of the spotters. Add to this list required training for your spotter network on the established radio procedures, weather observation reports desired by SKYWARN (wind, hail, wall cloud, etc.), operational areas for spotting, etc.
Sorry for being a little wordy here but you were looking for opinions. This is just mine and it is worth every penny you paid for it ...
CommShrek
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okcetech said:
All of these questions and more could be answered by clicking on the link I made in the previous post www.okarkskywarn.org
SKYWARN doesn't have classes. The National Weather Service in Tulsa does put on some classes though. SKYWARN doesn't have a statewide repeater network either. They do however utilize the repeater system of both the TRO (www.tulsahamradio.org) and the TARC (www.w5ias.com).
Please check out the above links. I think they would be helpful in answering some of your questions.
okcetech
Member
The NWS has a spotter class every year and 145.410 is the Skywarn net repeater freq in Oklahoma County. What more are you wanting?
http://www.norman.noaa.gov/nsww2005
http://www.srh.noaa.gov/oun/skywarn/
http://www.norman.noaa.gov/nsww2005
http://www.srh.noaa.gov/oun/skywarn/
K5MAR
Member
okcetech said:
The 145.410 MHz machine is a liaison repeater, NOT a Skywarn repeater. Skywarn activities should be conducted on a separate repeater pair. Net control or the EMA responsible for the field spotters then passes on pertinant information to OUN via the .410 machine, or a machine linked to the .410 machine. From the second link you provide:
Note: this isn't the way that things are done at TSA (Tulsa). The difference is TSA has ham ops as net control operators, while OUN uses staff meteorologists who also happen to be licensed hams to monitor the ham side of things. So the activity needs to be restricted to essential traffic for OUN.
Mark S.
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mfolta1
Member
anyone remember the buffalo link system? that was the bomb while it lasted. too many "good ole boys" though, didnt like to be told they couldnt use their repeaters to ragchew during sever wx. i remember ole mat or dennis, kc5evh i think it was?? anyway i listen to the norman office staff meteorologosts on the norman machine which is linked to many statewide repeaters. its pretty cool....
K5MAR
Member
Yeah, the Buffalo Link was pretty slick. But, in addition to the good ol' boy problem you mention, there was also an ego problem on the part of a person who ran the link. When the NWS said things needed to be changed, he decided to pick up all his marbles and go home. Parts of the link still work, but the repeaters are now "private", and require special access codes to activate some operations.
Funny story, we had a blind ham (KC5***) in Stillwater who fancied himself a "storm spotter". He would listen to the spotters on the city EOC freq and on the local repeater, then call the NWS on the link and report what he "thought" he heard. It all came to a head one night when I had to call the trustee of the link repeater (this was not an "owned" Buffalo Link machine, it was the university ARC repeater affiliated with the Link). (This individual heard a city spotter say he was at the airport and couldn't see any sign of rotation, he then called the NWS and said there was a tornado seen at the airport!) The blind ham got a call a few minutes later and was told to call the trustee on the phone, where he was banned for life from the machine. I spent 30 minutes on the phone with the NWS the next day getting things straightened out, as they had become plenty pissed!
Mark S.
Note, there is another blind ham in Stillwater, WB5AGZ. who does a lot of net control operations and such here in Stillwater. This is NOT who the above story refers to.
Funny story, we had a blind ham (KC5***) in Stillwater who fancied himself a "storm spotter". He would listen to the spotters on the city EOC freq and on the local repeater, then call the NWS on the link and report what he "thought" he heard. It all came to a head one night when I had to call the trustee of the link repeater (this was not an "owned" Buffalo Link machine, it was the university ARC repeater affiliated with the Link). (This individual heard a city spotter say he was at the airport and couldn't see any sign of rotation, he then called the NWS and said there was a tornado seen at the airport!) The blind ham got a call a few minutes later and was told to call the trustee on the phone, where he was banned for life from the machine. I spent 30 minutes on the phone with the NWS the next day getting things straightened out, as they had become plenty pissed!
Mark S.
Note, there is another blind ham in Stillwater, WB5AGZ. who does a lot of net control operations and such here in Stillwater. This is NOT who the above story refers to.
mfolta1
Member
yea, no offense to any "hammers" out there but i rarely use the ham radio anymore during severe wx. i got sick of the "yahoos" getting on and reporting heavy rain and crap. i mean you never hear cops get on the 2 way and say crap like "theres fresh coffee at qt" etc. anyways i can only imagine what kind of "yahoo" the guy in stillwater was. any way,,uh 73's..LOL!
K5MAR
Member
Yeah, but I hear a lot of them (as well as "official" EOC spotters) in many areas reporting heavy rain, frequent lightning, or pea-sized hail. Oh, and wind gusts of 20 MPH! It's not confined to the ham bands. What's the saying - Stupid is as stupid does!
The guy here is gone. :lol:
Mark S.
The guy here is gone. :lol:
Mark S.
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