ARES: After the CatastropheKay Craigie N3KN

First Vice President, ARRL

GAREC-2006

Because most disasters are local, the ARRL’s traditional decentralized response is usually appropriate and effective.

In extraordinary disasters such as the Gulf coast hurricanes of 2005, however, the scale and intensity of the disaster overwhelm local Amateur Radio resources.

Local Amateurs may be disaster victims, unable to volunteer for some time after the disaster occurs.

Local Amateur Radio infrastructure, such as repeaters, may be destroyed.

Meanwhile, a window of usefulness has opened for Amateur Radio – the time between the onset of the disaster and the restoration of conventional communications.

National-level relief agencies ask the ARRL to dispatch hundreds of Amateurs to the disaster zone for communications assistance.

How prepared are we to mobilize large numbers of Amateur communicators during extraordinary disasters?

The ARRL’s traditional decentralized approach is not well-suited to what is expected of a national organization when extraordinary disasters occur.

Success in the field has not blinded us to shortcomings at the national level.

Changes began during Katrina

• Interdepartmental staff leadership team formed at ARRL HQ

• HQ staff & Section Managers in the disaster zone held daily conference calls

• Regional coordination of field volunteers

After the hurricanes . . .

• Field volunteers’ after-action comments were reviewed.

• ARRL HQ staff leadership team was interviewed for comments and suggestions.

• Improvisation, creativity, and luck must be combined with planning!

Lessons learned, actions taken

• Improved infrastructure, planning, staff training at ARRL HQ & W1AW

• Committee of field volunteer officials recommends new national-level capabilities

• Discussions ongoing with national-level served agencies

ARRL is changing not so much what we do as how we do it

• National database of ARES operators willing & qualified to deploy rapidly outside home states

• New regional emergency coordinator function

• Equipment kits ready for deployment from ARRL HQ

Challenges for the future

Balancing our growing professional respectability and emphasis on formal training with the creative, improvisational spirit of Amateur Radio.

Challenges for the future

Using the story of Amateur Radio’s emergency communications success in support of advocacy goals

Amateur Radio’s success, contrasted to government’s failures, earned us both friends and enemies

The spirit of Amateur Radio in the Gulf coast disaster, in the volunteers’ own words . . . .

Each member of the four-man team felt we made a contribution to the relief effort of the Red Cross. We would respond again to an ARRL call for volunteers. We are ARRL ARES. This is our commitment. – KC7KPG

We did have one person whose grandfather was trapped at home. Although the Red Cross tried many times to get through by phone, it was ham radio that came through in contacting the proper people to get him out. – KD5JJP

I have never seen such misery and devastation. People (thousands) were sleeping in fields or under any shelter they could find – over 2 weeks after the hurricane – and thousands are still out in the open. People lost everything they had – many just had the clothes they were wearing. – WB2YIP

Before leaving I told Martha, my wife, that if all that equipment didn’t come back with me, we would just consider it a donation to the cause. – W5ALL

Fifty miles inland I found churches feeding the populace with no outside relief. A 40 meter relay and 2 phone calls later a schedule was made and by 9 am the next day vehicles were en route with food and water. A very humbling experience overall. You don't know how good you've got it until you see someone who's lost it all. – KC5FJZ

She kept saying “I need to go home and take a shower and get fresh clothes on.” So I asked her where home was. She told me. I said, “Your home is gone.” She said, “I found these clothes as I was walking around.” She had no shoes on her feet. – K9APR

I assisted and worked with the local Amateur Radio net control operators directly to exchange vital information about the needs, and welfare, and about vital information of all the parish shelters as well as assisting local evacuees in getting and finding shelter locations / clothing / lost family members for them. We worked 12 to 14 hour days in 90 degree heat (over 30C), with every 8th day off if you asked for it. – KC8QMH

They know they made a difference, and, when the need arises, they’ll be back. – KB1LQV

For 25 years ham radio in my life has been this vessel to help my neighbors – whether on the same street where I live, or thousands of miles away. We are people of the world, not just hams. – N1TAI