Nevada County ARES welcomes a new member:

Michael Schaub, KI7RQ
Michael is an Amateur Extra Class and joins ARES as a served agency representative working for Western Sierra Medical Center.

Tonight we welcome a new member, Martin Hadley, W7IPA. Martin is an amateur General class and lives in Grass Valley. Welcome Martin.

The first meeting in March will be held at the Nevada County Rood Center in the EOC. Doors will open at about 6:15P. The meeting will begin at 6:30P. The agenda includes testing the EOC radio equipment and giving members time to learn about the gear. If you arrive late, please call in on the radio.

The final meeting of 2023 will be held on Thursday, December 7, 2023 at 18:00hrs.
All ARES Members and their spouses are invited to this social gathering. Please RSVP to N6ERL so we know how many are coming. NOTE the early start time. Location is NC Airport.

Saturday October 28, 2023 Nevada County ARES will activate the Nevada County Emergency Operations Center (NC EOC) for the annual Simulated Emergency Test with the assistance of Nevada County Office of Emergency Services (NC OES). All amateur radio operators are invited to check-in with the ARES Net starting at approximately 08:45 PDT. The Net is hosted on NC ARC repeater system: 147.285+ (136.5 or 151.4).

The SET begins at 08:00 PDT with call-up of ARES members. The simulated event is a heavy snow fall that disrupts normal cell phone communication and utility power. ARES members and other amateur radio operators in Nevada County should monitor the repeater. One of the first elements of the SET will be a request from Net Control to send a Winlink message via radio or telnet with an attached Winlink GIS-Mapping Form – Situation Report.txt indicating simulated conditions at their QTH. Message is addressed to tactical address NCOES. ARES members AND ALL Nevada County based stations may participate by sending a Winlink Sit Rep message to NCOES.

For the first time, members of the Nevada County Neighborhood Radio Watch program will be participating in the SET. Messages will be sent to and from neighborhoods using the General Mobile Radio Service (GMRS).

The SET will include a contact with an ARMY MARS station as part of the 2023 SET-DOD Interop Exercise. Last year over 1,400 amateur radio operators were part of the exercise. This year N6ERL will setup a portable HF station at Nevada County Airport on 40M (NVIS) and will contact a MARS station in Coulterville, CA using Vara HF.

For more information, contact N6ERL@arrl.net

Great Shakeout is October 19, 2023 at 10:19L. Amateur Radio operators are asked to participate using Winlink to send a DYFI Form to USGS at about that time or anytime during the day. Details are available for download here:

Save the date: Saturday, October 28 8:00-10:30 – NC ARES will conduct a Simulated Emergency Test Exercise. NCARES Members will activate the station at the NC EOC and will also work from their home stations during the exercise.

All Nevada County radio operators are encouraged to monitor the local W6DD repeater system 147.285 beginning at 8:00L. ALL stations will have an opportunity to check-in to the Emergency Net, so please let us know you are listening when the call goes out for non-member check-ins.

Check this post for additional information.

The first of two Solar Eclipse events happens Saturday, October 14. This will be an annular eclipse. The event, as viewed from Grass Valley, begins at 08:05. The partial eclipse reaches maximum at 09:20 (0.882 Magnitude). The event ends at 10:43 for a duration of 2 hr, 38 min. As with all solar events, use solar eye protection (not sun glasses) or indirect viewing methods (e.g. pin-hole camera). CLICK FOR Eclipses in Grass Valley

Ham Radio stations will be active during the eclipse making contacts on VHF/HF bands for the benefit of NASA researchers. Join the Solar Eclipse QSO Party! For details: CLICK HERE

Nevada County Office of Emergency Services activated NC-ARES members during the recent storms. ARES members monitored local repeater 147.285 system, and local GMRS repeater CH21 for emergency 911-type calls in the event Cell service was overloaded or out of service. Members John Hart KE6FIQ, Martin Twer AJ6OH, Peter Mason N6ERL, KZ6B Alan James, KK6CUG Jeff Wagner, K6ACN Sean Robchiaud, KN6MMK Drew Mazer, and N6ZPO Robin De Negri took shifts monitoring. The activation began 3/4/2023 and finished on 3/9/2023 after the snow subsided.

Ten members of Nevada County ARES were sworn-in as Disaster Service Worker Volunteers for Nevada County Office of Emergency Services (NC-OES) at the Dec 1st meeting. DSWV members can be activated by NC-OES during emergencies to provide communications and situational awareness reports to OES as needed. NC-ARES is looking for more volunteers who would like to join our group. See Join ARES link above.