Hamming it up at the fairgrounds

Jerry Sill, center, listens as Mike Eberle, right, and Mike Miller, left, communicate with a radio operator at the Yuri
Gargarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Russia during Ham Radio Field Days.
Jerry Sill, center, listens as Mike Eberle, right, and Mike Miller, left, communicate with a radio operator at the Yuri Gargarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Russia during Ham Radio Field Days.

Amateur to experienced radio operators are gathering near the fairgrounds in Jefferson City to ham it up, or rather to test their skills for emergency communication.

The "Field Day" titled event is sponsored by the American Radio Relay League as a climax to Amateur Radio Week. The title is fitting since the radio operators, or hams, are traditionally stationed in the middle of a field and off the grid. They have erected their antennas and are using generators to power their communications, as if they where in a dire situation without the convenience of electricity or cell phone reception.

"It's an opportunity for hams all across the country to operate in a compromised position," said Jerry Sill, ham from the Mid-Missouri Amateur Radio Club, about the event. "We have two goals. The first is to educate the public and the second is to call in our operating skills that we would use in a emergency situation."

Sill said he wishes to let the public know that the amateur radio operators are out there and available to the public for when they are needed. The clubs slogan, "When all else fails, ham radio works," is a testament to how radio has helped establish communications between emergency services and victims of natural disasters such as earth quakes or tornadoes, he said.

"We have very active group of amateur radio operators in the community, there are over 50," Sill said. "And we are committed to helping support what we call supportive agencies like the hospitals, the Red Cross, police and fire departments."

In the field, the group has three stations for the public to venture and learn more about these skilled technicians. The first station is known as Side Band and is just regular voice communication, but the group uses it to make contact with other field day operators across the country, in Canada and the Caribbean. Last year, the amateur radio club made nearly 800 different contacts within 24 hours, Sill said.

The second station is called the Get On The Air station, or GOTA. It is the place to go for ham newcomers to learn about the process. There is a licensed ham operator there to answer technical questions and to help people get on the microphone and reach out to people across the country.

"There are two classes of hams that we expect to come to this station," said Karl Schulte, who helps run the GOTA station. "Brand new guys that just got their license ... and the other group is old-timers that were once hams and maybe their license has expired and they are just trying to get back into ham radio."

The old-timers getting back into the hobby are often confused at the changes in technology, Schulte said. He explained comparing the old radios to new radios is like comparing a 1957 Chevy to a modern computerized car.

"I just love it," Schulte said about ham radio."It is a wonderful hobby and I have made friends all around the world. It is a really nice for men and women and young kids. For me it has actually made a life-long career, because it was through ham radio that I got my interest in electronics and radio and had a career with Motorola."

At the far end of the field sits the Continuous Wave, or CW, station. It's where people can go to learn about Morse code and how to communicate with it.

"I have been doing this for 59 years," said Bill Gerth, operator and the CW station, about being a ham. "Morse code is rather low-tech compared with modern television or cellphones and things of that nature. But it is very reliable because basically we are turning the radio on and off at a rate which forms dits and das."

Using the code of dots and dashes Gerth can communicate in conditions that voice radios would have extreme difficulty in, he said. He added that you can also use light to communicate in Morse code and that a computer can translate the message. His group will be using their ears and brains to do all the work, though.

The amateur radio operators will be on site until 1 p.m. today (Sunday) testing their skills and informing the public on how they can get into the hobby. They welcome any all to join them and broadcast greetings and salutations across the country and beyond.

Link:

Mid-Missouri Amateur Radio Club website

American Radio Relay League website