Mira Mesa CERT Newsletter

Good morning, here is the News: Radio Drill tomorrow night—There is still time to get in on this, but I need to hear from you by 18:00 TONIGHT. I will start sending out call signs this afternoon. If you think you are signed up for this drill, and you don't hear from me by 19:00 tonight, then I don't have you on the list, shoot me a reply and we'll get you set up. Those of you who are participating, charge the thing, of get fresh batteries, whatever you do. Do it now. I'll wait. If you are not really familiar with your radio, now is also a good time to pull out the manual and get it tuned to Channel 7. If you bought two radios, find a friend (or a bitter enemy would work as well I guess) to do a radio check with you. Here is the rest of the detail, largely repeated for last week: You will need an FRS/GMRS radio for this drill, and something to write on/with. We will use Channel 7(FRS). Promptly at 5:30, I will make the following announcement from the rally point (near the Recreation Center on New Salem, just east of Camino Ruiz): Attention. Attention. Attention. This is Mira Mesa net control, calling the Mira Mesa Community Emergency Response Team. This is a drill. This is a directed net. Please make no transmissions unless called upon by the net control station. Emergency traffic may break into this net at anytime and will be acknowledged by net control. I will ask for check-ins of CERT members by area. When you check in give your call sign, the street you are on and nearest cross street. Make a note of any check ins you hear from your location and bring your list to the team rally point. I will then ask for responses by quadrant as follows: Quadrant 1: North of Mira Mesa Blvd, East of Camino Ruiz Quadrant 2: North of Mira Mesa Blvd, West of Camino Ruiz Quadrant 3: South of Mira Mesa Blvd, East of Camino Ruiz Quadrant 4: South of Mira Mesa Blvd, West of Camino Ruiz I will acknowledge your transmission by call sign. Please make a note of all other call signs you hear from your location (but do not contact them). After you have made contact, proceed to the rally point. Keep your radio on, and report any "new" transmissions you heard on your way in until you get to the rally point. You can record them of course, but only if it is safe to do so (pull over or stop at a light). Do NOT, under any circumstances, operate your radio while driving. It may or may not be technically illegal, I don't really care. If you don't hear my announcement, but you hear someone else's response, you can request a relay from them. The transmission sequence is: "[call sign] to [call sign relay] request relay to net control" "[call sign relay] to [call sign] acknowledged" "[call sign relay] to [net control] I have contact with [call sign]" "[net control] acknowledged" If you can't hear my announcement, request only one relay, don't request a relay from everyone you can hear (but do record them). Do not communicate with another station unless you need to make a relay. If, after 5 minutes, you have not heard from anyone, drive half the distance to the rally point (or as far as makes sense to you), pull over and try again. You may need to get out of your car, FRS inside a vehicle can be iffy. When we all get to the rally point, we will plot locations on a map of Mira Mesa and see how we did. Usually coverage is pretty good, with a few holes we know about. June Meeting/exercise—In June the 10th falls on a Sunday. We are planning a joint Battalion 5 rescue exercise. This will count as a Team Meeting. We will probably be at the Carmel Valley Recreation Center. It's a bit closer to our Battalion's geographic center. This will be straight-up rescue techniques, carries and drags, log roll into the litter, loading a backboard etc. We'll also practice knot tying. If you have back/leg problems, plan to come anyway, and declare your issue at the start of the drill, we will work within what you think you can do. Knot-tying will start from the very basic, so if you don't have much practice there, this is a good one for you. No time set yet, I need to work this out with Team Carmel Valley, and I'm a bit behind on some things. I'm shooting for the afternoon after lunch, plan on two hours. All for this week. Questions, comments, reply to this email, I'm right here. -Steve