Is amateur emcomm ‘a waste’?

I have thought about this for months, thought even harder for the past few days, and finally got the fortitude to sit down for four hours and put it into words — and almost thought about not publishing the work out of fear of rocking the boat. This essay might be a little bit rambling and half-baked. Maybe I’m way off-base. I know I’m not the only amateur radio operator with these views. And I’m absolutely positive there’s a ton of amateurs who don’t agree with me.

The beauty of amateur radio is that it’s many things to many people. Amateur radio is what you make of it, whether it’s HF, VHF/UHF, ATV, CW, PSK, Hellschreiber or even internet modes like CQ100. It’s not anyone’s place to tell you that whatever you enjoy in a hobby is incorrect. This isn’t a “that’s not amateur radio” post, I’m not going to say emcomm has no place in amateur radio. That’s like telling a stamp collector that he’s collecting the wrong kind of stamps or an artist using acrylic paint isn’t a real artist. I would, however, like to offer some points for your consideration.

I had never made up my mind about what to think about the growing emcomm section of amateur radio, until I happened to see Steve KB9MWR’s YouTube video (embedded below) via Steve K9ZW’s blog. I have struggled to find a stance on all of the issues surrounding it — I had some basic thoughts about it, but I couldn’t put it into words. Steve does an outstanding job of summarizing the words that I’ve been trying to put together:

Let’s first recognize that ARES/RACES/MARS/CAP/REACT and other acronym organizations do good work. Overall, they are trained very well and put a lot of time and effort into their hobby. I usually participate in Skywarn on my own activation, and have done a few ARES events as well.

However, you can be the most well-trained organization and your served agencies still won’t see the need for your services. What I mean is after 9/11, Hurricane Katrina, and other emergencies and disasters, radio system engineers have wised up and made their systems more redundant. Systems will still fail, but they have at least one more redundant system to fall back on, and if that system fails, there is usually a plan for that as well, and it likely involves something like simplex communications using their own frequencies — not amateur radio operators.

Not only does radio system redundancy make amateur emcomm obsolete, but some hams still insist that their services be used even when the served agency’s radio system works perfectly fine. When the county emergency manager spoke at our club meeting earlier this fall, he also spoke about how he handled the flood emergency last year and mentioned there were people equipped with radio walking the levees regularly to report any problems or weaknesses. He tried to make the point that radio communications are extremely important in emergency situations.

A well-intentioned ham chimed in and asked “what kind of radios were they?” When the EM responded that they were EMA-rented radios, the ham started to go down a slippery slope. “Where are all the hams involved in this? Why wasn’t ham radio used?” This continued for several minutes while I began to grind my teeth until another ham stepped in.

The other ham made the point that basically said if it ain’t broken, don’t fix it. EMA had a radio system that worked for them, and it’s their call whether to use them or not. If the radio infrastructure is there, all the EMA employees have to know is how to use the push-to-talk button.

Many hams aren’t seeming to cope well with the fact that today’s modern systems are more reliable than they were in previous decades. They still insist that amateur emcomm needs to play a role in an emergency whether their served agencies need them or not. Nothing will burn bridges faster with agencies than hams trying to elbow their way into emergency operation centers and disaster areas.

Here in Iowa, we have a couple recent examples. The Cedar Rapids public safety system stayed online even as the downtown area was inundated with water during last year’s epic flood. The EF-5 tornado that tore through Parkersburg last year took lives, homes, vehicles, and power — but not cell phone systems or radio systems.

Steve also makes the point that some emcomm organizations are being taken for granted for free labor. In my county, the ARES emergency coordinator has made it clear several times in no uncertain terms that the ARES operators are allowed to only perform duties related to radio communications — not transportation, not lost and found, not first aid, not barricades, not traffic control. Only setting up radio systems and radio communication itself are allowed. This is an excellent policy that should be implemented ARES-wide to prevent agencies from exploiting the organization’s manpower outside of radio.

That also brings me to the point of hams going above and beyond their job descriptions to “help out” — which often involves getting in the way of the real professionals trying to do their job. I’ve heard horror stories of hams showing up uninvited to large-scale structure fires or vehicle accidents and end up getting in the way. Thankfully, this hasn’t happened in my area. These are usually well-intentioned hams, bless their hearts, but their desire leads them astray.

There’s a up-and-coming mindset that amateur radio’s sole purpose is emergency communications. According to §97.1(a), yes emcomm is one of the purposes of the amateur radio spectrum, but let’s not forget about (b), (c), (d), and (e), which promote the hobbyist aspect of amateur radio through advancement of radio innovation, community education, and the advancement of international goodwill. It troubles me when an emcomm radio operator carries a “holier-than-thou” attitude over other hams just because he or she has “special Homeland Security training,” whether it’s in the incident command structure or otherwise. Again, I’ve been fortunate enough that I haven’t seen this in my area, but in other regions it runs rampant.

Even without the ARRL establishing ARES, amateur radio operators have — and always will — help out in emergency situations when needed. We don’t need several formal organizations for this.

The ARES command structure established by the ARRL is ridiculously elaborate enough to be the shadow government for the United States. Have you seen it? It’s obscenely bureucratic, once you see it you’ll know the cause for most ARES screw-ups. Not to mention the politics that take place among ARES leadership.

Most of the positions within ARES command requires membership with the ARRL. What’s the reason for that? So that the ARRL can make more money. Not only is that a terrible reason, but it also keeps radio operators that are otherwise qualified out of contributing to ARES because they choose to not give their money to a greedy organization for one reason or another. I wonder how many outstandingly talented operators this keeps out of the ARES leadership roles that could have helped the organization run more efficiently and improved the organization overall?

Inefficiency. The basic plan for an ARES event if the governmental radio systems fail, then hams will either use their own pre-existing infrastructure or improvise and build a new temporary system for the event. Then, due to FCC regulations, the ARES operator will partner up with someone in a served agency. The person that the ARES operator is partnered with will have to give the message to his ARES partner, then the ARES operator will say the message over the radio, where the ARES operator on the other end will receive the message and pass it on to their served agency. See where governmental agencies would rather spend money to reinforce their infrastructure and use their own systems? In one of my other jobs where we use radios on a regular basis to administer athletic events, I could not imagine having hams do this instead of just using our own radios, even if it is free labor. It would be absolutely agonizing.

In a true emergency, I’d be willing to bet a large number of the same hams that continuously do ARES drills won’t be able to help in a true, unnanounced emergency for several reasons — medical problems, family, work — after all, it is a true emergency. A large number of hams could be displaced. Their equipment could be destroyed.

The only trait that separates amateur radio operators from everyone else are their technical abilities — the ability to troubleshoot, improvise, build/rebuild systems, and the knowledge of all the different bands and modes available to complete the task. Yet those skills are diminishing with the new emcomm generation. I have admittedly been guilty of being an “appliance operator” at times, for several various reasons that will probably be covered in another post. But once we lose these traits, we have no more of an ability than any other human being that knows how to squeeze a push-to-talk button.

It’s another stigma to all of amateur radio that comes along with the new emcomm generation. It’s not just a stigma, but a phenomenon, too. Most people think it’s a taboo subject. I’m talking about the new hams that are infatuated with putting blinky lights and official-looking stickers on their cars more than they’re interested in learning about the technical aspect of amateur radio. If you are a visitor of Hamsexy, then you probably know what I’m talking about. If not, head over to a thread on Firehouse for an official definition from real professionals. These people are a danger to the public, but luckily, I haven’t observed this kind of behavior in my area whatsoever.

Since KB9WMR’s video has been passed around the internet, there’s been a lot more chatter about the “big tent” theory. As I said in my opening few paragraphs, amateur radio is what you make of it. I accept anyone’s passion for whatever their niche is in amateur radio. I will never interfere with what they enjoy doing with their ham license. It’s not my business to do so unless they are interfering with any of the rights I am granted with my license. We’re all working together, doing different things under the same tent.

Along the same lines, K9ZW has proposed the “freecom” theory. Apparently, I have been doing freecom since I took my test. Freecom emphasizes self-preparedness as opposed to a crowd-sourced ARES-oriented system. The ARRL states that emcomm is one of the biggest reasons new hams get their tickets. I didn’t get my license for emcomm, aside from participating in Skywarn.

When my job as a photojournalist took me to the devastation in Parkersburg after the EF-5 tornado ripped the town in half, my entire viewpoint of self-preparedness and disaster situations changed drastically. I’ve wanted to get my ham ticket since I was a kid, but when I drove into Parkersburg just at sundown when there were still livestock in the trees, it changed everything and it pushed my desire to get a ham ticket. I would encourage you to read more about freecom on K9ZW’s blog.

Should we have emergency communications in amateur radio? Yes. Should we be educated about preparedness? Yes. Do we need to keep maintaining an inefficient, overly-political, antiquated, bureaucratic emcomm-specific radio organization? No. Amateur radio operators have always been willing to help in times of true emergency, and that won’t change if ARRL didn’t have its grubby little hands all over it. ARES-type emcomm as we know it could use some restructuring and attitude changes. When all else truly does fail, agencies will still want us, whether we’re trained in ICS or not, and whether we’re ARES or not.