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Published on 12/08/1997 All articles from this issue

When the going gets tough ...

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By Joanne Griffith Domingue

Town Crier Staff Writer

Ham operators 'on the ready' to help local residents

Some say El Niño. Others say el nonsense. Either way, the ham radio folks in Los Altos are ready.

With their hand-held ham radios, the size of garage door clickers, they're ready to monitor rising creeks if the rains come. They're ready to watch for downed power lines, broken branches, plugged storm drains if the winds come. They're ready to send teams to help out in other areas if the storms pass us by.

Whether the hams are helping out during an emergency, a special event or on their own, "they are invaluable," said Lucy Carlton, Los Altos police chief.

"We could not operate a number of special events or in an emergency. We desperately need their help. They are a vital communications link to our city."

Emergency preparedness

Many consider Los Altos resident Walter Read the granddaddy of emergency radio service in this county.

"He got it all going 40 years ago," said Ann Paull, the amateur radio emergency coordinator for Los Altos. Paull also serves on the city's emergency preparedness committee.

Read, 85, began taking emergencies in 1934.

When his first one came, "it was about 2 a.m. I heard an SOS from a small East Coast town. There was a flood in a town of 200-300 people. They were below a big dam. And it broke.

"Power and lights were out. But a ham on a small, battery operated radio got through.

"I got on the phone and called the Red Cross in Washington, D.C." Thanks to two ham operators, on opposite coasts, help was called and lives saved.

"That was my first introduction" to emergency calls, Read said.

From then on, he's been a part of two to three emergency responses each year.

"One time during a hurricane in Wichita Falls, about a quarter of the town's roofs blew off.

"I learned things as I went along, things we'll need to know here."

He remembers the Alaskan earthquake in 1964. He received messages from a Catholic monastery, in Alaska, and was able to relay information back and forth between mothers, fathers, sisters and brothers.

"People are so anxious after a disaster," he said.

Should the "big one" hit locally, Read is ready. He has two generators and antennas that can reach around the world.

Paull, as emergency coordinator for Los Altos, would organize the response.

There are two types of emergency response, Paull said. One, ARES, amateur radio emergency service, is when a ham sees a problem and responds.

The other, RACES, radio amateur civil emergency service, goes into effect "only by invitation from a governmental agency," Paul said.

Ham operators have an edge over cell phones because "if the cells go down," in an earthquake or storm, "the phones won't operate," Paull said.

Of course, ham antennas could go down too.

But "we have back-up ways of erecting antennas," Paull said. She has two back-ups, a ladder line she could pull up into a tree and a J pole, a 5-foot antenna, that lives in a closet when not in use.

The nerve center for Los Altos in an emergency is the Emergency Operations Center at the police department.

In Los Altos there are "well over" 300 licensed ham operators, Paull said. She estimates there are 50-75 in Los Altos Hills.

As "head ham," Paull would put together an emergency response team from among the 10-16 from Los Altos and Los Altos Hills who check in each Monday night with Paull.

"That's the pool of known people," known to each other for working together and known to Paull as being available during a given week, said Tom Cascone, a licensed ham operator and Los Altos resident.

His interest in ham radios grew from his day job in which he is disaster services coordinator for the Palo Alto Chapter of the American Red Cross.

Those 10-16 Los Altos residents who check in are part of SPECS, the Southern Peninsula Emergency Communication System that includes Palo Alto Mountain View, Sunnyvale, Los Altos and Los Altos Hills.

Altogether, about 60-70 area ham operators log on during the regular Monday night "net. A net is a bunch of people really networking," Paull said.

Special events

The hams don't just sit at home waiting for an emergency to happen.

They play an active role in communications and safety during special events.

"We've had hams at all strategic locations (around town) since 1991 on Halloween," Carlton said. "Those extra ears and eyes. I don't know what we'd do without them."

For the Safe Street Halloween program this year, six hams, wearing orange vests, were out at specific locations.

There were no lost children. "But we had lost parents. We knew where the child was. It was the parents who were lost," Paull said.

For the Nov. 30 Festival of Lights parade, 23 ham operators were stationed around town.

When a report of a lost child came in, "We announced to all hams, the child's description and approximate place last seen. We don't generally give lost names over the air," Paull said.

"There were at least three lost children," Paull said. "We found each one within three to seven minutes."

Window on the world

Los Altos resident Darla Jean Current has "made numerous friends" through her work as a licensed ham operator.

Current, 43, suffers from hereditary ligamentus laxity, which keeps her house bound. Her joints don't work as they should, causing serious chronic pain.

Often she gets around in a wheelchair. After sitting awhile, her joints snap and crack as she slowly, painfully unfolds herself from a chair and stands.

"I joke and say, 'some assembly required,'" she said.

For her, the ham radio is a window on the world. She lives with her mother in the house where she grew up.

"I do a lot of listening," she said, of her time on the radio. She carries her small radio with her around the house.

Holding a hand mike is hard for her so she uses a "push to talk" switch and a headset.

Sometimes she spends two to three hours a day on the radio. "When I'm hurting and can't sleep, I get up and chat, in the early morning hours," she said.

She's also always enjoyed the technical aspects of ham radios and the tinkering.

Her father, a communications satellite engineer, was also a licensed ham operator, so she grew up with a "radio room" part of their home.

She was able to work until 1991 when her disability forced her to move back home.

As her joints have gotten worse, and her world narrowed, "radio opens the world back up. It's very meaningful to me. My number of friends has expanded considerably," she said.

She has radio friends all over the Bay Area, "Dennis in the East Bay, Tom in Concord," she said.

Current is a great booster of her ham radio colleagues in the area.

When Los Altos resident and licensed ham operator Tim Shroyer came to city council last June to appeal the architectural and site control committee's denial of his application for a 57-foot antenna, Current came, too.

Using her motorized wheelchair to approach the podium, she told council the application, which was within the city guidelines, should be approved. She called the denial "narrow minded and provincial."

Federal law requires that cities give ham antennas "reasonable accommodation" because of the role ham operators play in emergency response.

The application was later approved "with conditions that landscape screening be maintained," said Los Altos Planning Director Larry Tong.

Folks agree that hams, all volunteers, are a community treasure. By federal law, their services are free. They may not charge for any help they give.

That's why they're called hams - "radio amateurs and the name ham stuck, like amateur actors," Read said.

"Los Altos is fortunate to have Ann Paull," Read said. "She recruits, trains and drills us in preparation for the 'big one.' Hopefully, others will be inspired to join her in her programs."

For more information, call 941-2666.

Many hams keep a log book of their contacts. When they sign off, they say, "See 'ya down the log."