A trend among groups of radio ama­teurs involved in emer­gency com­mu­ni­ca­tions is the use of dis­as­ter sce­nar­ios to test equip­ment and learn lessons from what went right dur­ing an exer­cise, and what could be improved.

Recent­ly a num­ber of such tests have occurred in the Philip­pines, North Amer­i­ca, Europe and else­where. Every year emer­gency com­mu­ni­ca­tion groups engage in Glob­alSET, or a sim­u­lat­ed emer­gency test, with each IARU region hav­ing been involved since 2006.

The Glob­alSETs have test­ed the capa­bil­i­ties through mes­sage han­dling, and in 2015 a pre­pared­ness or call-out exer­cise was held to mea­sure the imme­di­ate, short and medi­um term avail­abil­i­ty by radio ama­teurs should an emer­gency occur.

When author­i­ties and respond­ing agen­cies test dis­as­ter pre­pared­ness, many groups involved ben­e­fit great­ly from the train­ing pro­vid­ed and by work­ing together. 

The lat­est is in ear­ly Octo­ber, first the Radio Ama­teur Cana­da, then a sim­i­lar exer­cise with emer­gency com­mu­ni­ca­tions admin­is­tered by the Amer­i­can Radio Relay League (ARRL) and Radio Ama­teurs Cana­da (RAC).

The aims are to find the strengths and weak­ness­es of the Ama­teur Radio Emer­gency Ser­vice (ARES), the Nation­al Traf­fic Sys­tem (NTS) and oth­er groups pro­vid­ing emer­gency communications.

Par­tic­i­pat­ing radio ama­teurs will gain expe­ri­ence using stan­dard pro­ce­dures and a vari­ety of trans­mis­sion modes under sim­u­lat­ed-emer­gency conditions.

It will also pro­vide a pub­lic demon­stra­tion to served agen­cies such as Red Cross, and, through the news media of the val­ue to the pub­lic that Ama­teur Radio brings, par­tic­u­lar­ly in time of need.

Adding some exter­nal per­spec­tive is the involve­ment some sta­tions in Europe who join in through the Nation­al Traf­fic System.

A num­ber of agen­cies are work­ing to devel­op emer­gency sce­nar­ios. Plans may be for a sim­u­lat­ed flood, seri­ous fire, severe ice storm, a miss­ing per­son, a major trans­porta­tion acci­dent, bro­ken gas line, or any oth­er imag­in­able disaster.

The Inter­na­tion­al Ama­teur Radio Union will read the out­come of this and oth­er SETs, as it con­tin­ues to advo­cate for the ama­teur ser­vice, and the role served by hav­ing avail­able vol­un­teers, equip­ment, spec­trum and training.

— Jim Lin­ton VK3PC, IARU Region 3 Chair­man, Dis­as­ter Com­mu­ni­ca­tions Committee