Bernalillo County ARES
Bernalillo County Amateur Radio Service (BCARES) is dedicated to providing auxiliary emergency communications service to the Bernalillo County Department of Emergency Management.
_________________________________________
In The News
The EmComm Training Organization (ETO) will continue the popular Winlink Thursday exercises to foster Winlink-knowledgeable operators across the country leading up to a nationwide drill November 13, 2021. Procedures will include a weekly exercise for routine practice with a fourth Thursday exercise of a more challenging nature. Exercises will almost always include a Winlink Express Check-in form.
You can find each week's "assignment" on the ETO web page, http://emcomm-training.org/
Remember to complete the exercise assignment and submit the message BEFORE Midnight Thursday.
________________________________
_________________________________
VHF Packet & RMS News
John, KC5QOC, Reports - He has also made some updates to his Albuquerque-based RMS Gateway station. They are summarized below:
a. Packet (1200 baud) and VARA FM RMS Gateway on 145.07 MHz (KC5QOC-12).
b. Packet (1200 baud) RMS Gateway on 145.01 MHz (KC5QOC-10)
Peter, NM5PB Reports - I have spun up a new dual-mode VARA FM (Vara is fully licensed) RMS Gateway on 145.070 (NM5PB-13). It's been online for about a week of testing and is ready for primetime use.
You can connect on that frequency using VARA or Packet 1200b. I'm in the process of testing at higher speed packet modes ( 2400b 3600b, 4800b) within the bandwidth limits on 2M.
The packet side of this is speed agile so as I do testing, you may not be able to connect unless you use a faster packet speed outside of the 1200b limits of hardware TNCs.
The station is putting out 20W and is up 24/7.
I'll be spinning up a UHF dual-mode RMS Gateway station as well and will post to the BBS once its complete.
You can also find out more about Peter's VHF Packet and RMS Gateways by going to nm5pb.com.
________________________________
The SCEST Digipeater W5SCA-11 is DOWN for maintenance, retrofit and location change.
The Cedro Peak 145.150 MHz Repeater is down. We suspect it is a victim of a recent lightning strike. We are pursuing efforts to get the actual repeater site and its crosslink to the UHF Hub back up and operational; however, I don't have a date when it will be completed. from Jim, KC5RUO
__________________________________
The BCARES East Manzanita Mountains digipeater and node packet radio station is located at 80 Raven Road at the Bob Foster, K5CQH, repeater site, approximately 20 miles SE from Albuquerque at an elevation of 7730 feet. The antenna that services the packet radio station is located on Bob's 140-foot tower.
Raven Road Packet Station SSIDs and Alias Names:
Raven Road as a digipeater SSID: K5CQH
Raven Road as a digipeater ALIAS: RAVNRD
Raven Road as a NODE callsign: K5CQH-11
Raven Road as a NODE ALIAS: RAVNRD
GRID: DM64tx
Latitude: 34.985988
Longitude: -106.344309
____________________________
New Packet Digipeater
CLICK HERE for a document from Jim Frazier, KC5RUO describing in detail, Bob Foster K5CQH's new Packet Digipeater and Node located about 20 miles SE of Albuquerque at an elevation of 7,730 feet.
____________________________________
Useful Slide Shows
CLICK HERE for a Slide Show on "How to Use a RMS Express Form to Check In to the Thursday night BCARES Net".
CLiCK HERE for slide show on "How to Send ARC 213 Messages using Winlink"
CLICK HERE - Mike, KM5GH's Winlink RMS Training. Information here in is based upon Winlink Express version 1.5.32.0 and using a Kantonics KPC 3+ USB Terminal Node Controller
________________________________________
__________________________________
Amateur Radio's Public Service Events Calendar - 2021
Volunteers are urgently needed to help with communication demands during the following worthwhile local fund raising efforts.
September 26 - Tour of the Rio Grande Valley - a long standing, popular bike ride of 39, 29, 78, and 100 miles that hams have supported for many years. There is a need for hams to provide communication along the route. This event also follows a round-trip route in the Albuquerque-Belen corridor.
This event is coordinated by Bob Longoria, N5JH.
October 10, - Santa Fe Century (Details Forthcoming)
October 16 - Cedro Peak Trail Run
Saturday, October 16th, 2021 at 7:00am - 6:00 pm
Location: Oak Flat Campground, 34° 59.902'N 106° 19.333'W
This year there will be 50K (0700 start), 1/2 Marathon (0800 start), and 10K (0830 start) races. The last runner is expected to finish by 1700.
As before the Start/Finish will be at Oak Flat Campground off of NM Rt 337, south of Tijeras. There will be four aid stations to man with communicators.
Total number of Amateur Operators to fully staff the course, function as NCS and ANCS is TBD but there will be 2 shifts (morning and afternoon) at the Start/Finish (NCS/ANCS) and the first Aid Station, for sure. Our role is to provide safety, logistics, and first/last runner communications from the Aid Stations to the Start/Finish. We will use 2 Meter repeaters and simplex on the course. HTs will work for most situations, but higher power and gain antennas will be more reliable and will be required should one or both of the repeaters fail.
You can obtain more information about the event at cedropeaktrailevent.wordpress.com
_____________________________
October 17, - Duke City Marathon (Details Forthcoming)
Those wishing to help out should contact Ed Ricco N2LI. n5li@arrl.net (505) 247-4866 (h) or (505) 768-7314 (w)
___________________________
______________________________
BCARES Meeting Notice
Thursday, October 7, at 6:30PM
We have been authorized to resume our monthly BCARES Team in-person meetings.. IMPORTANT NOTE: THIS IS A THURSDAY EVENING. The BCARES Team meetings will now be on the first Thursday of every month and NOT the first Wednesday. There will be NO VHF/UHF net aired on the first Thursday of each month. Hence, the BCARES meeting replaces the BCARES Net on the first Thursday of every month.
The location is, 6840 2nd St NW, Albuquerque, in the Atrium Building. The meeting is held in the Bernalillo County Department of Emergency Management Emergency Operations Center (EOC). Enter via the BC OEM sign on the east side of the building.
WEAR YOUR MASK!
___________________________________
BCARES Net, Thursday 7PM 145.13, 145.15, and 442.05 MHz
PLEASE JOIN US: for the weekly Thursday evening BCARES Net at 7 PM on the Bernalillo County Amateur Radio Emergency Service repeater system (145.13, 145.15, and 442.05 MHz) with Bill Tucker, K5WRT, as Net Control. However, There is NO Net on the first Thursday of the month as the BCARES meeting will be taking place at 6:30PM.
BCARES EOC Radio Room Packet Operations Updates.
Winlink Express software version 1.5.32.0 and VARA HF are installed on both the Station 1 and Station 2 PCs.
_________________________________
___________________________
Just So You Know…
Antenna Installed at the Balloon Park Museum.
BCARES completed the Balloon Museum public safety communications antenna system installation for the Bernalillo County Department of Emergency Management today, 9/17/2020.
It involved the installation of a permanent 50-ohm coax cable run through the bulkhead wall of the roof hatch and the installation of a VHF antenna on the rooftop railing of the Balloon Museum.
_________________________________________
Updated FEMA Courses
I noticed that FEMA released an updated course IS-800 . d on 5/6/2020. So, the current versions of the courses our members need to take are:
IS-100.c (6/25/2018),
IS-200.c (3/11/2019),
IS-700.b (6/25/2018), and
IS-800.d (5/6/2020)
It is important that all of us take the latest versions of these four courses as there have been some significant changes.
Note that there is still no IS-802 course available. After I take the updated IS-800.d course, it may become clear why this is so and whether the ESF-2 COMU concept is still valid within the National Response Framework. I'll fill you in if I come to any conclusions.
73,
Ron Reder, NM5AA
Emergency Coordinator
Sandoval County ARES
______________________________________
Sandoval County ARES (SCARES) repeater at INTEL
Receive Frequency: 444.70 MHz
Transmit Frequency: 449.70 MHz
Offset: 5.0 MHz
Offset Direction: PLUS
Name: INTEL
Tone Mode: Tone
CTCSS: 100 Hz
Rx CTCSS: CSQ
Comment: Linked to SCARES Repeater Network
73,
Jim Frazier, KC5RUO
BCARES Emergency Coordinator
The 145.13 MHz Repeater Information as of 5/23/2019
Input Frequency: 144.53 MHz, PL Tone = 100 Hz
Output Frequency: 145.13 MHz
Location: Fire Station 35, along Paseo del Norte, NE Albuquerque, near the intersection of Lowell and Paseo del Norte
11700 Paseo del Norte NE, Albuquerque, NM 87122
The 145.15 MHz Cedro Peak Repeater Information as of 5/23/2019
Input Frequency: 144.55 MHz, PL Tone = 100 Hz
Output Frequency: 145.15 MHz
Location: Cedro Peak, Tijeras, New Mexico
The 442.05 MHz Repeater Information as of 5/23/2019
Input Frequency: 447.05 MHz, PL Tone = 100 Hz
Output Frequency: 442.05 MHz
Location: 1120 Coors Blvd SW, Albuquerque
