Getting Families Started in Emergency Response Communications (ERC)

Before you begin jumping into ham radio and emergency communications, we encourage you to ponder and pray about the counsel we have been given to prepare and to be prepared for the last days and for emergency preparation.  The Lord can help anyone understand the complexities of subjects they haven't tried before - even electricity and radio communications.  You are encouraged to seek the Lord's help in learning something new and to practice relying on Him as you do so and He will help you. In a disaster situation where these would be used, we are going to have to learn to adapt and improvise and learn new things that may be hard for us.  It is easier to do that now when we have time, than in the situations themselves.

The Lord has not counseled us to panic (panic is not preparation) or to be afraid (fear is not faith), but we have been counseled to have optimism and faith in the Lord's promises.  We would counsel members to pray about how to best prepare their families in all areas - spiritual and temporal - and pray for wisdom, guidance, inspiration and for ways to be opened up for you to be able to prepare.  We would also encourage members to remember that the Lord does not give a commandment except He provides a way for us to accomplish what He has directed us to do (1 Nephi 3:7), including learning something that may seem very challenging such as amateur radio. You are encouraged to know that this is important, to gain a testimony of it's importance, and for help in both preparing and knowing how to prepare.

We have been encouraged as individuals, and families well as stakes and wards to be prepared for emergencies and disasters, both at the family as well as the church level. Even if a family is prepared with supplies and food, without communications they are cut off from their most important resources: each other and the church.  (All of you who are hunters should be jumping in on this, also).

Baofeng UV5R radio

Internet, telephone, cell phones, and satellite communications can all be cut off or disrupted. Ham radio is the most widely used, most versatile, and most capable form of emergency communications.  Our stake goal is for every single family to obtain at least one ham radio that they know how to use so they can tune in and at least listen & receive emergency communications from the government and/or the church in a disaster or emergency when other communications are lost.

15" antenna

The saints have been admonished to be frugal in their preparations.  The goal is to get as many members involved as we possibly can for the lowest cost possible. Above all, you are encouraged to pray  for guidance and help in your preparation.

The recommended radio is the Baofeng UV5R handheld radio with a 15" antenna (~9-15 miles transmission range) or an Abbree "tactical" 42-48" antenna (20-30miles transmission range). The radio runs around $22, the antennas run around $10.

Our best range on the 15" antenna was 71 miles from Ontario to Silver City through the War Eagle repeater.  The 15" antenna is a bit easier to maneuver and use carrying around, the longer "tactical" antenna can get a lot longer range, but is a bit more difficult to use (keep it vertical while extended so it doesn't bend or damage the connector to the radio). 

Hold it vertically so you don't stress/break it.

While there are "better" (and more expensive) hand-held radios and antennas, this radio will be sufficient for localized ward and stake communications in an emergency.  While it would be really neat to have a $200 handheld radio with a ton of whistles and bells, or a $500 radio with an LCD touch-screen display,  for $200 you can outfit 9 people with UV5R handhelds, or even put in a inexpensive mobile radio in your vehicle. Most of those whistles and bells will not be used by us in an emergency. Also, most of the "higher end" handhelds actually have more limitations than the UV5R when you consider all the frequencies/bands they can be made to operate on.

There are different models of the UV5R that are advertised as being "high power" with "long-range" having 8 watts or so of power out of the box.  In the ham radio world, 8 watts is not a lot of power, especially when we consider that some ham radio operators use over a thousand watts in some systems. 

Power is only part of the equation, if you have a hill in your way or there is radio interference, spending more money for three more watts is not going to do you a whole lot of good. You can also have the most amazing radio in the world but if you have a lousy antenna it's not going to do you any good.
 

(click to continue)

The "rubber ducky" antennas that come with the UV5R radio are extremely durable, but they are extremely poor at reception and transmission long-range. This is why the very first thing that's recommended is get a  more efficient antenna. We have been able to use this configuration successfully across most of the southern parts of the Ontario Stake, to Weiser, Parma, and Vale. We will cover in trainings how we compensate for distance with equipment in the future, as well as more powerful mobile and base-station systems, but for here we are focused on getting families to be able to at least listen and communicate locally, which the UV5R can do very well. 

The battery that comes with the UVR5 will last at most 24 hours if it is just monitoring the airwaves (monitoring = turned on in case a signal comes in, receiving = signal is coming in that you can listen to over the speakers, transmitting = you're keying the mic and sending out info - each of these uses a bit more power than the one previous, at best if you held the mic down continuously - don't do that, it's bad for the radio - it would theoretically stay on for almost 2 hours).  

If you wished for your radio to run 72 hours, you'd need at least 2 regular batteries to be able to rotate through charging options, or you can buy an extended life battery here (one option).

 

This one will run approximately twice as long as a regular battery, it has a port (hole) in the top of it (see right photo) where a charger can be put in it. If you'd like to just buy two with USB chargers that you can plug into the port, here's a link for that here (always check availability and prices and save your receipts).

I have even used the UV5R's to contact the International Space Station Transponders and have hit as far away as British Columbia and New Mexico with them.   They are the best start you can get, and a lot of us with advanced licenses have a collection of these as our fallback go to hiking/bug-out radio. Mine work flawlessly and they hold a charge forever it seems.Super rugged and durable.

I like to think of the UV5R as the radio equivalent of the old handcarts that were used by the Saints to trek westward when they were short on conventional or traditional modes of transportation like regular wagons (the handcart of ham radio, an economical entry-level starter into amateur radio communications).

Ultimately, mobile units - those that you mount in a vehicle - are where you begin to get a lot more range and capability, and some of the bigger base-stations (those can start running $1,200+) go worldwide with no issues, we're only looking at getting started, and having the ability to communicate in an emergency, and this will do it well enough.  The HF, or High Frequency, radios are an entirely different type of equipment, require different antennas and licenses, and bounce their signals off the ionosphere and around the world.  But for local ward and stake emergency communications the UV5R and VHF communications will get you through. 

Ultimately, in the worst-case scenario this will be the radio that you use (or whichever handheld transceiver "H/T" you choose) because you can throw it into a backpack, it's extremely durable and simple and is self-contained. Also, so many people have them that getting batteries or chargers for them is a lot more likely in a disaster.  You can get different radios or models of this radio in your own equipment, but be aware that if you have multiple kinds of radios in your gear, they may take different chargers and it may take more equipment to support and operate.  

In emergency preparedness there's a saying, "Two is one, one is none." Like most emergency supplies we have spares of, radios are no different.  Supplies should be accrued as you are able without financially burdening yourself. If you can get a single radio and that's it, do it.  If you can get one for each member of the family plus a spare one and you feel inspired that's a good choice, do it. If you feel inspired that there is more for you to do such as getting a mobile radio for your vehicle or a more capable radio and setting up an antenna at home, we can help you do that as well.  For now we're focused on getting people up and running. Licensed members are encouraged to participate in the weekly trainings a minimum of two times per month, while those who are learning to listen are also encouraged to tune in similarly a minimum of two times per month to get practice across a wide variety of conditions and a variety of training exercises.  Our goal is to continue this until we have a comprehensive stake plan developed for emergency communications and are capable of carrying it out, and then to continue to practice it as we move forward. 

 

 Our leaders have encouraged us to be optimistic and faithful looking towards the future.  A large part of that optimism comes from knowing how to prepare and having inspiration as we do so. My favorite part of ham radio is that in an uncertain world, I have things I can do to prepare as well as help others. I get to contribute to helping the church in ways I never would have expected.  The ham community has been the most helpful I've ever found, and many friends have become eternal friends as we've worked together on this. 

My favorite verse when it comes to preparation is: If you are prepared you shall not fear (D&C 38:30).