Ham radio operators play crucial role at big events and emergencies

Each year across the United States, the Fourth of July means picnics, barbecues, parades, fireworks displays and other celebrations. For people in the Atlanta area, it means one thing more: the event that has since the late 1970s been designated the world’s largest 10-kilometer run—The Peachtree Road Race.

The event each year draws approximately 60,000 amateur and professional runners from around the world as well as more than 150,000 spectators. “With that many people and July heat and humidity, even early in the morning, there are bound to be emergencies,” observed Elliot Fried, a member of Alford Memorial Radio Club, a local chapter of The American Radio Relay League (ARRL). The organization volunteers to have members stationed at strategic places during the race as part of a communications network designed to quickly get help during medical and other emergencies that arise during the popular race.

Fried is the organizer for ARRL’s role in the Peachtree Road Race as well as other events that involve large crowds. ARRL uses its off-grid radios to communicate with first-aid stations, ambulances, and others that need to be contacted quickly. “We also developed a system of raising colorful umbrellas that help identify the site of an emergency,” he said. “We’re the only people allowed to have umbrellas at the Peachtree Road Race.”

“We only go where we’re invited,” explained James Penland, emergency coordinator for the American Radio Emergency Service, “but people are glad to have us. We’re often the difference between life and death not only when things go wrong at planned events but when natural disasters occur. When a major hurricane hit Puerto Rico a few years ago, we were the only functioning communication system. Because we operate off the grid, we can communicate when commercial systems such as telephone lines are not operational or are overloaded. Our slogan is ‘Amateur radio, when all else fails.’”

Penland and Fried were among the amateur radio operators gathered June 22 and 23 at Pleasantdale Park in Doraville for ARRL’s annual “Field Day.” Describing Field Day as “the most popular on-the-air event held in the United States and Canada,” Penland said the event involves more than 35,000 “hams” from clubs or simply friend groups in North America who come to operate from remote locations, including parks, shopping malls, schools and back yards.

At the Pleasantdale Park event, DeKalb County first responder organizations sent members and equipment to support the event. “We are an official part of their emergency plans,” Penland explained.

Field Day, according to the organizers, is “part educational event, part operating event, and part public relations event. The goal is to put together a self-sufficient, working radio station quickly and begin making as many contacts as possible in a 24-hour period.” They also have fun swapping stories with other amateur radio operators, according to Penland. “You make a lot of friends as a ham radio operator. Some you never meet face-to-face; you may know only their voice and their call sign.”

Amateur radio operators have been around for more than a century and are responsible for many innovations in airways communication, Penland explained. In the early days of amateur radio, its operators were often pejoratively called “hams,” but the hobbyists have embraced the name and now use it proudly.

Material distributed by ARRL says the organization “numbers within its ranks the vast majority of active radio amateurs in the nation and has a proud history of achievement as the standard-bearer in amateur affairs.”

Penland explained that amateur radio frequencies are the last remaining places in the usable radio spectrum where individuals can develop and experiment with wireless communications. Hams not only can make and modify their equipment but can create whole new ways to do things, he said.

Today there are almost 750,000 amateur radio licensees in the United States, more than 18,000 in Georgia, and more than 2.5 million around the world. Many of the participants in the Pleasantdale Park event were Baby Boomers, but Penland explained that there are many younger volunteers at events such as the Peachtree Road Race. “We are actively trying to attract younger members,” he said. “I believe that once they’re involved, they will find it rewarding and enjoyable.”

For more information, visit www.totr-radio.org.