At 3/26/2008 08:14, you wrote: >Maybe you haven't been to a test session lately. Since >the FCC et al lowered the standards and did away with >Morse Code entirely, the quality of the new operators >is a lot lower than you might want to acknowledge. >Sure, the guys who have been hams since the 1970s >probably know which end of a tube to plug in, and can >figure many things out. But who's gonna show up to >volunteer? All the new guys with zero experience who >see the event as public relations and glory.
W.r.t. the primary public service event I'm involved with (LA Marathon), we simply don't allow untrained individuals to volunteer; pre-event training is mandatory. >I agree that commercial rigs are a lot more foolproof, >and if new repeaters come on the air that often, then >someone will just have to keep up with programming >them. This has nothing to do with "new repeaters". Out of all the repeaters serving the area, can you predict which ones will still be on the air after a disaster? If not, can you program every single one of them into your commercial radios? Around here it would amount to nearly 100 repeaters just on 2 meters. > Not really a big deal. In some areas of the >country, the only bands capable of accepting new >repeaters aren't covered by commercial equipment >anyway, so it's a non-issue for things like 1296 MHz. I guess the other areas can speak for themselves w.r.t. "allowing" new repeaters. Here in SoCal there are new repeaters hitting the airwaves nearly every month. Bob NO6B
