Muscatine County ARES Team Receives Grant
On Wednesday, June 21, Scott - NØMRZ, and Bill - KC8TWZ received a check from the Community Foundation of Greater Muscatine in the amount of $5,000 as a grant that was provided by private donations, It is to be used to buy amateur radio equipment and construct Go-Boxes for use during natural or man-made disasters in and around Muscatine County. This equipment will vastly improve our communications even if we would loose the KCØAQS repeater that resides on the 245' tower on the MCC grounds.
This equipment will be vital to our communications plan we currently have in place to take care of our served agencies such as the Salvation Army, American Red Cross, and National Weather Service to name a few. It will also greatly benefit our team in our training exercises and not only free up our personal equipment, but give us standard equipment that all operators can get familiar with. That way when deployment time comes they are working with a piece of equipment they know how to operate in the time of need. It will also allow us to provide communications for events that take place in our community such a RAGBRAI or any other event. Those types of events become good training exercises for the team.
Thank you to the Foundation for understanding the services that only amateur radio can provide to the community, and the surrounding communities by providing us with the tools needed to be able to help when it is needed the most. When all other communications services fail, amateur radio will still be there. Amateur radio operators have the knowledge needed to be able to make sure that important information makes it to the Public Service Building, and if need be throughout the state or neighboring states.
The Muscatine County Amateur Radio Service was formed approximately 3 months ago when the state appointed C. Scott Richardson - NØMRZ as the Emergency Coordinator for Muscatine County. He appointed Kevin Kramer - N2AM of Durant, IA. and William "Bill" Coulter - KC8TWZ of Muscatine as Assistant Emergency Coordinators. The team is now 15 members strong and growing. Most of the members are also members of the Muscatine Amateur Radio Club (MARC) which is a non-profit organization that was founded in 1948. The MARC has been a tremendous help in the formation of this new group that specializes in serving during times of need.
The Muscatine Amateur Radio Club now has an FCC and ARRL accredited Volunteer Examiner (VE) team that can give amateur radio tests. If you are interested in amateur radio or public service communication you can get more information at www.MuscatineARC.org, or on the sponsored pages at www.MuscatineARES.org It is a great hobby that has something for everyone. It is the perfect way to give back to your community and provide a service that no one else can.
To see more about how amateur radio works, stop by the Muscatine Community College grounds this weekend near the McAvoy Center right off Park Avenue for an annual event / contest called Field Day (June 24-25). It runs from 1:00pm Saturday until 1:00pm Sunday. There will be several portable stations on-the-air making as many contacts as they can in a 24 hour period. Some on voice, and even one using morse code. There will even be a station that anyone can set down and make a few contacts for our group with the assistance of an FCC licensed radio operator. Hope to see you there!
73, de Scott - NØMRZ - EC - Muscatine County ARES