My little band of like minded friends, most of whom are hams, decided about a year ago to pick 2 frequencies for the sharing of information, We don't do a net, have no set time to operate or any guidelines except for proper operation by licensed operators. Most of us remember 9/11 when we couldn't make a cell call for days here in South Carolina, and land lines were spotty. So we picked 14.250mhz USB and 7.250mhz LSB. If something happens, be it tornado, hurricane, flooding, a real insurrection, whatever, we start listening on those frequencies. We suggest listening on the hour and half hour for 5 minutes if things have really gone south. I posted the frequency in a post a few days ago and got a few questions about it. The Amateur radio spectrum is really quite large and finding someone to talk to during an event can be a daunting task. I talked to my little group and we decided to share what we do with as many others as have an interest. For example, last week we had a tornado drop down 1/2 mile from my house (no damage, it went away from me). My power was out so I had no idea what had happened. I walked out to the radio room and started listening on 14.250 and immediately heard a friend about 30 miles north calling. We were barely hearing each other so went to 7.250 and he asked me about the tornado. He still had TV and was able to tell me exactly where it happened. This was the first time our little system had been used, and over the next hour 7 more folks stopped in to get the full picture of what happened. Please not that this isn't secure and isn't meant to take away from the Monkeynet frequencies. This is for the timely and open discussion of unfolding events in real time. Relays and welfare checks are encouraged. Passing along relevant information to Skywarn nets is also a good thing. So if you are a ham with privileges on these frequencies, consider tuning in during the next big thing.
I think this is an excellent idea and should be integrated with any other procedures one has like monitoring AmRRON, ARRL or etc. Information is key in any emergency and 2024 and 2025 are going to be hairy, real hairy and will test us like nothing before. So remember, 'Knowlege is Power'.
