Wilderness Protocol with Ham Radio - SOTA (2018)
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 4 ต.ค. 2024
- This video describes a process to aid in outdoor survival using ham radio and the WILDERNESS PROTOCOL. If you hunt alone, participate in Summits on the Air - SOTA, hike deep in the wild, or spend anytime in the outdoors, the chance of needing somebody to rescue you may happen. Search and Rescue teams will appreciate a savvy outdoorsman who makes a plan, writes it down, shares it with others, then sticks to the plan so they can find you quickly. Don't let them and your family down; know the WILDERNESS PROTOCOL and use it.
For a written Hiking Safety Plan visit my website at www.kg6hqd.us and scroll to the bottom of the ABOUT page for a FREE download.
If you have comments or questions, I PREFER you add them here and not email me so that others can benefit from the dialogue. I also ask you to include your ham radio call sign if you have one in your comment so I can recognize you if we QSO one day.
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73 - KG6HQD Jerry
Have you heard of the Wilderness Protocol? Anybody have any stories to share of how ham radio has aided in a rescue while in the field? Please leave your story below and include your call sign if you have one.
I generally think using simplex is OK for SOTA. I feel that if there was a break, or as you mentioned traffic on the air, people would stop and allow the traffic.
Totally agree with you!
Power management and conservation is the whole point. At least for me. I only use small, QRP radios. It’s my thing….
I learned something from this video. The value of watering holes. The time sequence is a great thing to know…. Thanks!
By the way… I’ve use my 20m zip doublet all the time! I lean my mast against the tree I sit under. Especially while using my QCX Mini or 20/40 Weber. Thanks again…
OUTSTANDING SOLDIER !! RAN ACROSS THIS VIDEO VERY HELPFUL. THANK YOU.
This video could end up saving lives. I'm contemplating joining up with you ham operators and following the tradition of my older brother who has been an amateur operator since 1966 with call sign KC7PF. Now I'm off to post links to this video to my fellow fans of Death Valley National Park where we often are way out there all alone.
Monitoring for the Wilderness Protocol in areas like Death Valley is a great idea. Granted I myself haven’t been to Death Valley yet but I can imagine repeater coverage even out there is slim to none. So monitoring simplex in that situation is vital. I would even take it one step more and monitor a group of simplex frequencies in a scan. Not just the common frequencies but frequencies allocated for simplex in our local band plan. 73’s
@@Whiskey6Radio I hope you visit Death Valley some day to see what you think of my favorite national park.
@@DeathValleyDazed actually will be going in the fall with my Scouts for a weekend campout. I’ll have my ham radio and Garmin Inreach Mini
@@Whiskey6Radio Cool! Please share photos and videos of your adventures.
Do a lot of hiking and backpacking. Great information. Thank you
Gordo! WB6NOA!
I owe him many thanks, his books and cassette tapes helped me get my first ticket (Tech+), and later my General.
73' de kc5jsr, John C.
P.S. I monitor 146.52 and 121.5... 24/7, good habit to get into, you never know.
Ya, Gordo is a local and accessible to me and I'm very thankful for him and Suzy. What is the 121.5? Is that the air traffic AM simplex plane to plane type freq? If so, that's new to me and I wonder how much traffic you hear on that?
KG6HQD Jerry It's the ELT Frequency that activates if a plane goes down.
good to know, thanks
Jerry, I just happened to come across your Wilderness Protocol video when I was looking for one of your other TH-cam recordings - I did not know you had made this. Great job! I will add one story since part of the Protocol as you mentioned is that one also monitors 146.52 when in the backcountry during the 5 minute window times besides just knowing how to use it under emergency conditions. Years ago in my backpacking days, a group of us who were hams were on a long trip through the Sierra Nevada's. During the Protocol time, I put out a call on 146.52 that I was just monitoring. I was answered by another ham somewhere else in the mountain range who also was on a backpacking trip. We would have never have known each were out there except through hooking up on simplex. Earlier this year, I also had posted two links on the Vilas County Amateur Radio Club WI website, of which I am a member, about the Protocol and the use of 146.52 as the National Calling Frequency: www.vcarc.net/wilderness-protocol.html and www.vcarc.net/national-calling-frequency.html . Scott WA9STI
Thanks Scott! Since I put this video together I have learned the WP is printed on the inside panel of the ARRL repeater guide but, as suspected, most people were unaware. It's good to keep in mind for sure and I appreciate you sharing the info for a video topic idea.
I'm a avid hiker and ham license holder and will be monitoring on 146.520 every 3 hours starting at 7am to 7pm👍💪. KN6CST 73.
I’ll admit I know my battery power through much field time. Unless on multi-day trip I go all day on 146.520 regardless. I also carry a spare battery even on day hikes. Simplex is where it’s at in the mountains.
@@KG6HQDJerrySOTA Yeah I hear you. I just got my ticket about a month ago more or less. I normally have my HT on all day through out my day hikes and I also will be carrying a spare battery on both my day and thru hikes in the future. 👍
Jerry, I have been watching your videos since the first walkthrough of your SOTA gear. This is a great service announcement. I took the initiative and posted it to my instagram feed. Keep up the great videos.
Thank you Sean 😎. Your support is appreciated.
Good stuff; I learned about it reading a Bay Area radio club website. I have that flier in my backpack with other radio essentials.
Very cool! See, I was interested in how many others actually heard of this and so far its a pretty mixed bag with most people being unaware. Glad your club is on it's game.
Btw, call is AK6XR
www.mdarc.org/activities/ares-races is the site I found out about the Wilderness Protocol.
Thanks! Sometimes I'm able to recognize calls I've worked while doing SOTA; then again sometimes I can't remember what I had for breakfast lol.
I learned about this in my ARRL repeater pocket directory and decided to youtube it to better understand it, thank you for the video! Currently monitoring.
Glad to have shed some light on it for you.
Great Video and info 👍🏼. Much appreciated will share!
Thanks Gabe!
Outstanding topic! I preach the importance of how to use the National Calling Frequencies to my family (all are licensed). As an avid camper I use 146.52 and APRS so I can be found should my trip get FUBARed.
likewise!
I've seen and read for years 3/3/3 (Channel 3 or National calling frequency, for 3 minutes, every 3 hours starting at 12 midnight)
Great useful information Jerry! I've never heard of this protocol before until now so it's definitely worth sharing. Thanks! 73 KG5SDE
Thanks Brad.
Great info. Thanks for sharing. New sub.
Thanks man!
Good stuff. I think that article in particular has been republished in different forms in alot of the prepper communities.
Really? I wasn't aware, did you know about the WP then?
An explanation of the Wilderness Protocol has been included in the forward pages of the annual ARRL Repeater Directory for many years. Mark (AG6UK)
Interesting, had no idea and sounds like many others weren’t aware either.
Jerry, thanks for bringing attention to the Wilderness Protocol. It will only be effective if people are aware and use it.
Agreed, thanks for letting me know of it’s location in the ARRL repeater directory too. So much info available out here that sometimes it’s easy to get lost in it all.
I just stumbled on this video via fb as an avid outdoorsman and a 6 month old ham radio operator I found this a great video and advice to follow. I even posted it on a few fb pages including my own thanks
Kn6mat
Awesome 👍🏻 glad you’re helping spread the word. Much appreciated
KG6HQD Jerry honestly dude great video. It’s hard to find good videos online in regards to ham radio basics. I’m always searching for more information. I’m following you now. Thanks and 73
Thanks! 👍🏻
I used our repeater to summon help for a co worker who went down while driving a propane truck. Radios aren’t “allowed” in our trucks, but an HT in the back pack beats hollering for help when there’s no cell service.
Good on you! It would suck having to hike miles holding a cell phone above your head trying to make a call for help all while the person who needs help is left behind.
I sure wish the 2 gentlemen who ventured into the SGW. Last weekend had radios with them. It’s always horrible to hear of loss of a life due to extreme conditions in the backcountry. That poor guys son had to hike out 2 hours to get cell service. Maybe if he had a radio his dad could still be alive.
I didn’t hear about this yet but what a bummer & agreed, cell service in our local mountains, and many others, are spotty at best.
during your summits contacts you could listen at the correct time, it is only 5 min.
You can do whatever you like. If I understand you right you are asking me specifically to listen when I’m activating?
Good info Jerry, thanks. Many preppers/survivalists that use mostly the PRS bands (FRS, GMRS, MURS, CBRS) have adopted a similar 3-3-3 rule. It's basically 3 minutes on, every 3 hours, on channel 3 (FRS 3, GMRS 3, MURS 3, etc.). I think it would be nice if it also started at 7am though, so the plans would basically coincide. As it is most often applied now, it's every 3 hours starting from midnight, so two people using each plan will never hear each other. Maybe it's time for a modified plan that unifies the plans - perhaps a 3-3-3 Wilderness Protocol, that starts at 1am, includes PRS channels 3 and the Ham Call freqs (including HF, UHF & SHF), runs for 3-5 minutes each, and offers 8 opportunities in 24 hours instead of 6, would be a cool plan. I'v been thinking of putting something like this together for my emergency radio site at BetterSafeRadio as I have many ham and prepper clients. Thoughts? 73 de K6LED
I wasn't aware of the prepper version but I like that 3-3-3 idea because it's easy to remember. Maybe you should combine the two and send it to QST for consideration so the larger ham community could hear about it too?
Yeah, I'm going to try and put something together soon and publish it on my site to get some feedback and maybe refine the plan a bit, then perhaps share it around if people like it. Cheers and thanks for the prodding. ;)
Cool, look forward to seeing the end product man 👍🏻
I think there's also a different schedule for maritime HF radio. It's probably no longer in use, though.
If you find it please let me know as I’m often on my boat at sea too.
Thanks for posting this! I have not heard of it before but it really got me thinking. Be great to share with my club, friends and fellow hams! Thanks again! Jeff AB6MB
Awesome, thanks for sharing Jeff!
Hey Jerry! Another idea to spread the gospel of the wilderness protocol: I just embedded this vid on my QRZ page. -A-Ray N4ARY
Sweet! Thanks brother
Basically same as marine radio protocol and also the. Prepper CH3 project
Marine as USMC or Mariners? Good that more people at least know about it.
I have watched this video a few times and just recently stumbled on another frequency that is monitored by off roaders at least here in Southern California. It’s 146.460. Might not be a bad idea to add this frequency to the list to monitor and or call out. Especially if your in an area with back roads near by. Chances are there are jeepers out there playing around. Kn6mat
That’s also a frequency that the Papa System user base lists as their first option simplex frequency. The list can grow quite easily.
KG6HQD Jerry good to know thanks
KG6HQD Jerry it’s amazing what you can learn while on vacation. 2 important frequencies I’ll be on/monitoring from this day forward. Thanks Jerry for such useful information
There’s so much info out there these days it’s like drinking water from a fire hose. Glad you got something you can tuck away and use if needed.
KG6HQD Jerry I have the advantage of having Keller Peak in my backyard. Through that repeater my wife has contact with me almost anywhere I go locally which is a huge advantage. Besides that 52 and 46 are in the memory banks of the 5 radios I own. And when I’m exploring/camping or just relaxing. I’ll be monitoring and throwing out my call when I can. Kn6mat
Jerry it appears as if your site is down and the aforementioned documents are not available for download. Happen to have an updated resoruce list/protocol. I'd love to see it.
I went to your website and it immediately infected me with maleware with a fake pop up saying I had 5 viruses per McAfee. This is a malicious pop up that I had to buy software to remove.
Shared this video on minds dot com
I came across this pretty early on in my time in ham radio, and it makes a lot of sense. The problem we have here, is these clowns who endlessly ragchew on the calling frequency. They all use base rigs, and it is absolutely impossible to break in with an HT or QRP rig for a SOTA activation, let alone an emergency. When I started asking around, I found out that they think this is a good idea, because it "shows there is life on the band" - which is absolute horse manure, because all it does is makes people turn their volume down, or change frequency; nobody wants to hear to incessantly bloviate. As you mentioned in a previous video Jerry, I think we should all be monitoring 146.520 as much as possible, and I'll preface this with: I am NOT one of these self important "ham radios saves lives" types, but if someone was in real trouble 146.520 would probably be the first place they turn, and they aren't going to get any help if everyone has their radios off because a couple of guys decided that frequency is their personal chat room. As for SOTA activations on that frequency, keep them short and leave pauses. If someone wants to chit chat, move up the band. And, of course, respect the wilderness protocol timings. I think a guy on a mountain top with an HT is setup better to help someone calling for aid on 146.520 than a guy in the city gumflapping with his pal across town. There's also nothing wrong with periodically announcing on 146.520 that you're calling CQ SOTA on another frequency. Where we are, there aren't a lot of hams around, especially SOTA enthusiasts, so a lot of times, I rely on the calling frequency for my final contacts, and I've had the ragchewers blow activations on multiple occasions. On the same note, I've also heard someone requesting assistance, when the chitchatters didn't, and trying to get through to them was next to impossible and I was only able to by APRS message for him to move up to another frequency. The same is true for repeaters.
On another note, I'd like to see this modified to the old Marine emergency frequency rules: instead of every 3 hours, which is a long damn time if you're in trouble, it should be every top and bottom of the hour...or at least every hour. Tune in and bite your tongue for 5 minutes.
Man, that's unfortunate Mike. Once in a while we get a few folks that'll carry on a bit longer than they ought to here on 520 and I do like activity on the VHF band, but I've also felt the frustration of trying to break in on 520 with my HT from a summit to no avail.
I think 520 is a starting point for everything. If it's an actual emergency then keeping the operation on 520 until better coordinated or resolved is a good idea. If you are doing a SOTA I still think 520 is a good freq, as long as you're listening as much or more as you are transmitting. If it's going to carry on, which some hams are known to do, then moving up to 550 or 580 makes much better sense.
Is this what you were conjuring up during your bubble bath? LOL
It took me three glasses of wine, two bouts of bubbles and an entire Taylor Swift CD to come up with that many synonyms for "ragchewing"!!!
Anyway, I completely agree with you in the video and the comment. There is absolutely nothing wrong with short, respectful and courteous conversations on 520.
I don't know if my follow up comment posted, (I can't see it), but I think this protocol could use some fine tuning, if say, some handsome, well known, ham radio celeb, with a wide social media presence and well viewed TH-cam Channel wanted to champion it... Jerry, do you think K6UDA would do it?!?! LOL :P
I actually think this is a more appropriate time line as well and would probably employ this method if in need. Let's face it, you're going to do whatever you can to get help.
Ha! Only if he also played with his bubbles while listening to Taylor Swift :)
Subscribed KK6KTZ
thank you
Rodger that
Survivor ham KLE
Here we go 👍🏻
Jerry, as always, great video! Downloaded all three documents, but can only open the PDF file, any ideas? I'm not an Apple user, so not sure how to address the problem. Thanks again for sharing this info.
Thank you sir. I'll upload a PDF version of the Hiking Plan which should be universal enough for all. Thanks for letting me know I needed to do that and for checking out the video.