Zone 1 Coordinator Musings
July has been a very interesting and busy month for Zone 1 members. ZONE 1 MEMBERS - BE READY FOR CHANGE
Just as July began, we had a State to Region change underway which meant that frequencies, net designators, and the like, were all occurring at the same time as a voice message sending exercise started. All of this led to confusion for many Zone 1 members.
Instead of thinking of this situation as a negative, chew on this for a moment. This State training exercise could have been for real! How do we react to changes in a real life emergency? As MARS members, you will not have the luxury of having all the information provided by the State or Regional Training Office and at your fingertips? You will not have a MARS message telling you how the course of the emergency will proceed and when something important will occur?
As Texas MARS members, we must be completely adaptable in our day-to-day communications, in our emergency operations and MARS net operations and procedures. It is not hard to do, Just get prepared for the next State exercise or for the REAL thing. Be Adaptable!
VOICE MESSAGE TRAINING
Participation in this month's SMD\rquote s Training Exercise was much lower than expected. I am not going to address how many of our Zone 1 members actually sent a message or two or three but it was very low.
Ask yourself, in the last few years how many MARS voice messages have you sent over the air? None? One? Two? Ten? 50 or more? How can we as emergency communicators expect to be proficient in sending voice message if we have not practiced?
Let me ask you. How fast does your code proficiency (sending and receiving) deteriorate? Can you send and received at the same proficiency level as you did when you passed you old Novice, General or Extra class tests? Yes, CW is no longer required in MARS but if you don't use it you lose it. Recently, I tried one of the code tests at 20 WPM \endash wow! Was I ever rusty!
That my friends, is exactly what happens and did happen for many of us in the sending of MARS voice messages in the EEI, Info Response, and AAR formats\~this exercise. Couple this with propagation fades, static crashes, local interference and our ability to efficiently pass MARS voice traffic, our abilities drop down below acceptable levels.
In this months exercise, the same problems that have cropped up in every MARS exercise I have participated in were there again; misuse of prowords, our message reading speed was faster than humanly possible to copy, use of the wrong message formats and the list goes on and on. Only practice makes perfect.
I once sent a perfectly formatted MARS message, no mistakes on prowords, easy armchair copy for the receiving station, my word pronunciation was absolutely perfect, my MARS friends were standing and applauding my accomplishment, THEN I AWOKE FROM MY DREAM. The only way something like that will occur for each of us is, PRACTICE, PRACTICE, and more PRACTICE. One way you can practice is to be on the MARS nets sending and receiving voice traffic.
MONTHLY PARTICIPATION REPORT FORMATTING
I was amazed to find that almost half of the Zone 1 Monthly Participation Reports (MPR) received for June were improperly formatted.
SOP Chapter 5 CAM contains the new MPR format (see Table 5-1). The MPR no longer uses line A-1, A-2, B-1 and B-2 but now uses line 1, line 2, line 3, line 4 and so on. If you do not have a copy of the SOP Chapter 5 CAM, send a message to AAR6PC ZC1 or to AAR6BK AZC1, we will get you a copy.
Just remember, in the new MPR format, you are to\~have entries in line 1, line 2, line 3, line 4, and item 7 (Total number of hours serving as Net Control). You have served as an NCS this past quarter, haven't you?
Your MPR is to be sent to the Assistant Zone 1 Coordinator, Ed Franks, AAR6BK. I have directed Ed, beginning with the August 2007 MPR, that should he receive an MPR in the old format - to return it to the sender for resubmission in the new Table 5-1 format. Yes, you will get credit but make sure your message is correctly formatted.
ZONE 1 MEMBER PARTICIPATION
Folks, every Zone 1 member of Texas MARS is important to the State organization and eventually to the Region and MARS nationally. MARS should not be thought of as a "good ole boys" organization and I am not saying it is, BUT, we need to be attuned to the "needs" of members in our Zone. We each need to provide them encouragement and assistance as they travel along the MARS road with us.
I would like to invite you to participate with me in being a voice of encouragement for each member in our Zone. How? Here are a few examples of what you can do. You could call one another, send a short email of encouragement, you could be (and this is very important) a mentor or Elmer for one of our new "Slant Tangos". In short, be there for each other.
You have no idea how good it feels to receive an "Atta Boy" or "Atta Girl" from a fellow MARS member. So let me challenge you to call at least one Zone 1 member this month and every month. Just talk for a few minutes about any subject (even MARS, should that come up). You have no idea what this investment of a little bit of your time will produce in the overall scheme of things but it can not be anything less than wonderful. Please , give it a try.
Till next month, Peace and all good,
Don Josephs, AAR6PC
Zone 1 Coordinator