Highland Amateur Radio Association events
Courtesy of John Levo
It has been a busy past few weeks for the Highland Amateur Radio Association with the highlight of the amateur radio summer and other related events yet to come.
The season started with their April business meeting when they were addressed by the newly appointed American Radio Relay League Ohio Section Manager, Bret Stemen, from Licking County. Since taking office it was one of Stemen’s first official visits into Southern Ohio.
A few days later several HARA members met at the Hillsboro Cemetery for their annual placing of flags on the graves of veterans buried in the cemetery.
According to Cemetery officials, over 1,100 veterans from all wars beginning with the Revolutionary War.
Later that week, many members attention turned to Xenia’s Greene County Fairgrounds where almost 38,000 amateurs from around the world gathered for the world’s largest gathering of ham radio operators. Besides meeting many of the people they talk to over the airwaves, many HARA members volunteer to assist the Dayton Hamvention event.
Some assist with security, set-up and tear down or with internal transportation and communications. Others are involved with testing those wishing to obtain a first FCC license or upgrading an existing
one. In 2022, HARA was named the Dayton Hamvention Club of the Year which in many circles is considered to be the most outstanding amateur radio club in the world.
Next to come is HARA’s participation in a special event to honor America’s 250th Birthday – the annual 15 day Lewis and Clark Trail on the Air amateur radio special event operation. The sponsoring Clark County (WA) Amateur Radio Association selected HARA and the Portsmouth Radio Club to be the two clubs to represent Ohio, along with 30 other clubs representing their states, in the annual event.
The official trail starts in Pennsylvania and ends at the Pacific Ocean near Astoria, Oregon and helped open the West to settlement. The LCTOTA event will no more than be over when the annual American Radio Relay League’s Field Day emergency training exercise will held on June 27-28.
During that weekend tens of thousands of licensed amateur radio operators from all parts of North America will take to the airwaves from parks, emergency management offices, first responder facilities and other types of public locations to demonstrate how amateur radio can be a life saver in the case of a local, state or nationwide emergency or natural disaster.
HARA President John Willis, KE8JEM, states the local organization will set up stations and hold their training at the old Fisherman’s Wharf concession stand at Rocky Fork Lake. The event is open to the public. Set up begins on Saturday morning when they will assemble their stations, erect antennas and prepare for the 2 PM start of the 24 hour event. Using radios powered by off the grid sources
they will try and contact as many other amateur operators from all states, territories and Canadian Provinces as they can by using voice, data and even the old fashioned Morse Code. An attempt to make contact with the International Space Station as it circles the earth will be tried.
In addition to Field Day being a social, educational and fun event, its more serious purpose is to serve as an emergency preparedness training exercise. Over the years government officials have relied on the ham community to provide assistance should normal radio communications channels, cell, internet and
broadcast facilities be destroyed, damaged or otherwise unavailable.
Government officials call attention to such a need when in 2024 Hurricane Helene hit hard Western North Carolina and for days ham radio was the only means of reliable communications available to public safety and first responders. Those same officials tell of reports of lives saved and lost, medical evacuation requests, first reports of landslides and flooding all being first reported by ham radio.
For several years the Association has rung in the New Year using the large bell in the front of the Highland House Museum. The event has proven so popular that HARA made arrangements with the Highland County Historical Society to ring the bell to welcome America’s 250th birthday at midnight July 3-4. HARA invites the public to join in by ringing their own personal bells at that time.
The Highland Amateur Radio Association is a loose knit association of over 100 of over 200 federally licensed amateur radio operators residing in the immediate Highland County area. More information about amateur radio is available at the American Radio Relay League’s www.arrl.org website. Information about the local Highland Amateur Radio Association can be obtained at the June 27-28
Fisherman’s Wharf Field Day location, on the Club’s Facebook site, highlandara@gmail.com or contacting ARRL Assistant Ohio Section Manager, John Levo, at 937-393-4951.