“Back to the Beach” - June 2001

When MSS discovered they didn't have any communications support, the organizers were already way past late to make any changes and found themselves with a growing registration count for donations and no event communications to support their activity. Being in a difficult situation forced them to reach for the first ham group they could find; which is how we came to be elected COMM director for their Watsonville fundraiser.

With the month of June well underway, our prospects of discovering hams not involved with Field Day looked bleak. What was difficult was that we needed to get "blood-oath" commitments from 12 hams in fifteen-days and have them functional at 6:00 AM on Saturday, June 23rd. In addition, BA-MARC didn't have a net-control setup, so our task list seemed to be growing by the day as new items needed to plan and pull off the entire COMM and SAG support activities necessary kept increasing. Clearly this seemed like a good time to get stressed.

Our initial ham-staffing plan assigned ham-operators in rest stops first and then in SAG wagons as more ham volunteers signed on. Ham motor support would stay at one rider, David Sawyer KG6FHN, until we filled the rest stops and a couple of the SAG wagons with hams. As more licensed operators signed on, we would increase the ham motor support on the route. While we were slicing the ham motor support thin, we had six GoldWings with CB radios volunteering from the GWRRA Ca2S chapter, so route support wouldn't be bleak because the CB bikes could run back and forth from a scene to a rest stop to get there traffic moved. This staffing plan was our bare-minimum strategy to be sure the critical functions got filled as evenly as possible should we not meet our staffing needs for licensed operators.

A lot anxiety was developed as signups oscillated up until the final five days before the event. In retrospect, my worries didn't add anything to the process but they did give me something to do as I thought about where more help could be found. As time became short, it looked bleak until the Monday before the event when we went from only having 4.5 hams to all but one by Friday. Our last sign up came in the afternoon of the day before the event when Santa Clara Valley Repeater Society (SCVRS) member Martin Brown, AD6FG, said he would be there on Saturday to support our last uncovered SAG wagon. Going into Saturday morning, only our net control function would be under staffed with only one operator and no runner support for handling issues relayed by radio. Luckily, MARC member Warren Birmingham K6PHW assigned to work in our last rest stop arrived early and stayed in net control to help us cover the short fall in the first two critical hours of the event. His coverage took a lot of pressure off, as things were hectic getting people assigned and questions answered. Warren's support became critical when about an hour into our event we had a woman bicyclist hit by a car.

Within moments of the accident, SAG driver Sandra Pacheco KG6HHP, who just recently passed her license test and has now joined MARC, came upon the scene with ham operator Wayne Logan KD6LSK. Sandra assisted the fallen rider while Wayne handled communications from a very difficult and scratchy radiolocation on the course. The accident area was in such a difficult radio spot that communications were often relayed through the rest stop-1 operator who is Monterey FM-Radio personality Don Murry KQ6FM. Even with our rocky start, luck was with us again that day, as the woman's injuries were only minor and her bike was repairable. David Sawyer K1DRS soon had the bent bicycle stuff working enough for her to finish completing the 100-mile course.

This event was very successful because we were lucky and because the following hams gave up their day for this worthy cause and reported for duty at 6:00 AM on Saturday morning:

Each ham involved was critically important and did an outstanding job of manning their post. For a team that had never worked together before, the team spirit and support they gave each other was remarkable. Each rest stop location had its own difficult radio situation to overcome. In our most radio isolated rest stop located in Royal Oaks Park in the southern end of the course, our colorful and technically adept MARC member J.P. Rouland NQ6T arrived with a van full of radios and beam antennas determined he wasn't going to let the difficult terrain get in his way, and when we heard his signal, it didn't. His signal from that isolated canyon was just plain great. He helped us relay signals in that area that were having trouble getting into the repeater and impressed everyone who saw his amazing antenna farm with beams, quads and verticals erected from his van. J.P. was so focused on getting his signal out that he needed to get a battery-jump from park rangers to get out of there when the rest stop closed.

Placing NQ6T in this location proved to be a good assignment for this difficult location because of his technical abilities and involvement in our big accident. It was also admirable because he gave up his field day assignment to come to our aid.

MARC member Larry McDonald K6ACE held two positions during this event. Larry began the day patrolling the route on his motorcycle until it was time for our third rest stop to open. He then held down the premier and most coveted assignment location in the entire event. Rest Stop-3 was located at the famous Gizdich Ranch that is so famous for their pies. It is also the location where we held out first annual "BA-MARC Pie Race" in July of this year. At Gizdich Ranch, the pies are incredible and that is why it takes a lot of effort to dislodge motors and SAG wagons once they wonder into this heavenly food spot. Which is why I'm so impressed with Larry McDonald for leaving to continue patrolling the route when the rest stop closed. Let's see, he rode his motorcycle on some great roads, had a feast on some great pies and then road his motorcycle on more great roads. Hmmm, that sure seems like Larry knows how to get good assignments.

In this picture our quickly assembled net control station is displayed running a Kenwood TM-742 tri-band radio into a Comet CX-333 tri-band antenna. This radio is my home rig and the antenna was purchased for my home base station. Having worked with this antenna so successfully in this event, I've decided to keep it for our net control installations and will use something else for the base station. Our net control station performed flawlessly through out the event requiring only 5-watts out on the 220-band into the links of the WB6OQS repeater and 10 watts into the W6TAR repeater. Using an always-linked repeater system allowed net control to always listen to our second repeater system plus a simplex frequency without any knob twirling or confusion. Having a well-designed tri-band antenna made getting on the air simple because we only had to raise one antenna for our ham communications. Our Comet antenna went on to deliver a great signal all day.

Almost all event traffic was handled through two different repeater stations located at different end of the course. For most of the course we used the SCVRS linked WB6OQS repeaters for 2-meter, 220 and 440 located on Mt. Loma Prieta. For the canyons in the southern section of the course, we used the ECTAR group's W6TAR repeater system located in Prunedale, CA. When our second repeater was chosen, it was done knowing the Loma Prieta repeater wouldn't work well in the area on the southern end of the course. However, ECTAR's Prunedale repeater is located on the southeastern end of the MS-100 course and did a good job covering the lower section of the course and the area around and near the Santa Cruz, CA coast. Having this second repeater turned out to be additional good luck when signals from an unidentified user came onto the WB6OQS repeater system and began blocking the mobile event traffic late in the day. Because we had a second repeater, we didn't loose any time, or traffic in making the switch over to the W6TAR repeater when the interference began.

All in all, the event was a major success and the hams involved were seen as heroes to event organizers and participants. While we only had one big accident, we had scraps, broken bikes and spent bodies to fix, repair or bring back to event-central located at the KAO campground on San Andreas road in Watsonville.

Nothing got in our way of making our communications task a success for this event. However, a problem was hiding in the wings of the WB6OQS repeater when the very next day a fuse in the repeater's controller failed. This failure stopped all the functions of the repeater putting it off the air for quite some time. Now it could have failed on Saturday, but because we were lucky, it didn't.

When you're lucky, being smart doesn't matter.

73,
Roger...
W1RDR