RAC Bulletin 2009-10-24

RAC Ontario Section Bulletin for October 24, 2009

NATIONAL NEWS

1. Quebec Section ARES

I am pleased to announce the formation of a new ARES Group for the
Quebec Section. Under the direction of EC Mike Lachaine VE2EXB, RAC
Certified Emergency Coordinator, the group will serve municipalities
in the St. Jean Sur Richelieu region of Quebec. With the assistance
of Quebec Section Manager Gilles Lariviere VA2SGL, Mike and his group
have already met with some municipal emergency coordinators in the
area and have run some training sessions. Congratulations folks and
welcome aboard!

-- Doug Mercer, VO1DTM, RAC Vice President Field Services

ONTARIO SECTION NEWS

2. New EC For Renfrew County East

The region of Renfrew County in eastern Ontario now has a new leader
to help co-ordinate the ARES. Paul Dowdall, VA3COG has accepted a two
year service appointment as Emergency Coordinator for Renfrew County
East.

With a dedicated background in law enforcement and now as community
emergency communications provider Paul is certain to build an active
ARES program in Renfrew County East and extend his leadership role as
required in the Seaway/Capital District

-- Bob Gammon, VA3RX, Ontario ARES SEC

3. Bill 118 Precautions

Within the next few days police in Ontario will begin to pull over
drivers they see texting or talking on cellular telephones. It is
entirely likely that some amateur radio operators, who are legally
exempt from Bill 118, will be stopped if they are seen to be
operating their mobile radio equipment.

In order to prevent any unnecessary delay, amateurs in Ontario should
consider carrying a copy of their Certificate of Proficiency plus a
copy of the exemptions section of Bill 118, which you can find
on-line at tinyurl.com/yh8ocwa (Yankee Hotel Eight Oscar Charlie
Whiskey Alpha)

-- RAC Blog

4. Grey County Simulated Emergency Test

Grey County ARES completed its 2009 S.E.T. exercise on Saturday Oct.
17th. We activated stations at four municipal EOCs: Grey County,
Owen Sound, Hanover, and Durham.

The goal of this year's exercise was to establish a communications
network without using any of the VHF repeaters. Messages were
handled on two local 2m simplex nets and an 80m HF link from south to
north. Most of the messages had to be relayed. Some had to take
three hops. This exercise did not include any out-of-county messages
to provincial nets or to provincial EMO. While all of the EOCs do
have an emergency power source, we did not use them for this test.
This was our first exercise that included our new station VA3GCO in
the Grey County Building.

Thank you to all who contributed to the success of this event. For a
more detailed report see the "Extended Bulletin Articles" at the
racaresontario.ca web page.

-- Bob Droine VE3LKD, ARES EC for Grey County

ITEMS OF INTEREST

5. ARISS Contact with Boy Scouts of Canada

On Saturday, October 3, Scouts of Canada in Ottawa, Ontario
experienced an Amateur Radio on the International Space Station
(ARISS) contact. Three hundred scouts and parents were present as
Robert Thirsk VA3CSA answered questions about life and work in space.
Thirsk turned over a few questions to Mr. Guy Laliberté, Cirque De
Soleil president and spaceflight participant. Audio was fed into the
EchoLink AMSAT and JK1ZRW servers. The ARISS contact was held in
conjunction with the Scout Science Badge Award system.

-- AMSAT News Service