ARES/RACES Unit

Amateur Radio Emergency Service (ARES)

The Amateur Radio Emergency Service (ARES) consists of licensed amateur radio operators who have voluntarily registered their qualifications and equipment for communications duty in the public service when disaster strikes. Every licensed amateur is eligible for membership in the ARES.

There are four levels of ARES organization--national, section, district and local. In Prince George's County Ken Greenhouse, KB3IIE, is the Emergency Coordinator (EC). The Radio Officer (RO) is Dan Blasberg, KA8YPY.

It is at the local level where most of the real emergency organizing gets accomplished, because this is the level at which most emergencies occur and the level at which ARES leaders make direct contact with the ARES volunteers and with officials of the agencies to be served. The local EC is therefore the key contact in the ARES

Local ARES operation will usually take the form of radio nets including HF nets, VHF (repeater) nets, RTTY, packet or other special-mode nets, depending on communications needs and resources.

Operating in an emergency net requires preparation and training. This includes training in handling of written messages, generally known as "traffic handling." The specifications of an effective communication service depend on the nature of the information that must be communicated. Pre-disaster plans and arrangements for disaster communications include:

• Identification of Agencies and organizations who will need Amateur Radio communication services.
• Discussion with these clients to learn the nature of the information which they will need to communicate, and the people they will need to communicate with.
• Specification, development and testing of emergency communication services.

While much amateur-to-amateur communicating in an emergency is of a procedural or tactical nature, the real meat of communicating is formal written traffic for the record.

Formal written traffic is important for:

• A record of what has happened, frequent status review, critique and evaluation.
• Completeness which minimizes omission of vital information.
• Conciseness, which when used correctly actually takes less time than passing informal traffic.
• Easier transmission, receiving operators know the sequence of the information, resulting in fewer errors and repeats.

If you are a licensed amateur radio operator and would like to volunteer your communications services with the Prince George's County ARES/RACES program please contact the Office of Emergency Management at 301-583-1899.

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