Hamming it Up

Service Above Self does not have to be directly related to Rotary. Service can take many different forms and you can even serve others as part of a hobby. Once you are used to serving others, it just comes naturally.

On Sunday I helped with communications for the Cayuga Lake Triathlon. This once again reinforced my belief that even with all the cell phones we have, there is no substitute for the efficiency and reliability of amateur radio. Members of the Tompkins County Amateur Radio Club were stationed at Cass Park, at Taughannock State Park, and at strategic intersections along a 4-mile stretch north along Rt. 89. We passed messages to race officials and amongst ourselves to help assure the safety of the more than 700 bicyclists.

With ham radio all of the radio operators can hear what is going on at the same time and communications within the whole group is instantaneous; we are all monitoring the same frequency. So we can keep the race organizers informed of any needs that arise along the race course. Fortunately there was only one small accident, but the ham on the scene radioed it in immediately and the ambulance was there in very short order. Even if it is not an emergency, if a rider needs something, say a bike repair, help is as close as the nearest ham.

Just think how cumbersome this all would be using cell phones (if they worked at all in every place along the whole race course). You could not have open and continuous communications going at all times, giving everyone involved a complete picture of what is occurring on the race course. Then, if you had to reach someone, you would have to call the number, wait for the person to answer, and then, if more people needed to know the same thing, a second, third, or fourth individual call would have to be completed. This is very time consuming and inefficient.

That is why organizers of such events ask hams to handle their communications. For instance, we had a cadre of nearly 100 hams working at the Empire State Games, as we do every year. And year after year we are invited back since there is simply no other good way to handle the needed communications.

Besides this is all good practice for us. In the event of a wide-spread disaster, ham radio communications may be all that's left. Scary, but very true--even in this day and age.

So hurray for ham radio!

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