HVDN Notebook: Putting the HV on the map with SSTV?

For our third SSTV over FM test as part of the Ulster & Northern Dutchess Radio Net on Tuesday September 22nd, we had a lower turnout than past weeks but had the most success in participants decoding images and playing along.

The month of September is National Preparedness Month as sponsored by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). This weeks casual round table theme was "low cost, no cost preparedness".

Natural disasters do not wait for a convenient time. Preparing for them shouldn't wait either. Start today by having a look at various alert tools, gather and safe-guard important documents and take other low cost/no cost actions like ensuring your amateur radio gear is functional, programmed with appropriate frequencies and know how to use it without the aid of a manual or computer programming.

Doing all of this in advance helps lessen the impact of disasters and emergencies for you and your family.

Local Hudson Valley Weather Status

The WXL37 National Weather Service transmitter which serves the area is currently offline. It is unknown when this will be again online, so should there be a situation where there is internet or mobile service disruptions, a reliable and timely source of weather information excluding broadcast media is not available for our area.

Hopefully this is restored soon, especially since any weather alert radio receivers will not function until this is turned back on.

UNDR Net Participants on 9/22/21

Acting as alternate net control this week was Guy KD2TLF and our total participation this week was six and spread across the core of the Hudson Valley. Special thanks to:

KD2TQS - Ken - Rhinebeck - Dutchess County
WA2RKN - Jerry - Hyde Park - Dutchess County
K9JPT - John - Hopewell Junction - Dutchess County
KD2VAH - Jim - Poughkeepsie - Dutchess County
KD2TLF - Guy - Xena - Ulster County (ANC)
K2GOG - Steve - Poughkeepsie - Dutchess County (NC)

After a brief discussion about no cost planning, we moved to the SSTV over FM test using the Overlook Mountain Amateur Radio Club's amazing WA2MJM 146.805 MHz repeater located high atop Overlook Mountain.

As a reminder, UNDR Net is not currently affiliated with ARES, RACES, CERT or MRC but would love to be if it shows we can add value.

Finding people without giving away details

This week we started off making the audience think we were going to play a game of tic-tac-toe by sending images using the very fast PD50 mode compared to last week's PD120 and prior PD90.

Each mode takes approximately the number of seconds represented in the numbers of the mode, so thusly PD50 is nearly twice as fast compared PD120 with the only sacrifice being resolution and image size.

A picture is worth a thousand words, so a video is worth more than that, right?

Here is a nice video from John K9JPT showing how he used his smartphone to listen to the SSTV audio signal coming from his radio as sent by Steve K2GOG and is then converted in real time to the image.

For the next image, which Ken KD2TQS sent, included the "O" in grid B2 on the tic-tac-toe board.

Here is where we then changed things up from a simple children's game to something of more importance. This was the third image sent:

Using the details sent in the first two images, it was simple for our end users to then overlay the "X" in A1 and the "O" in C2 to help provide travel directions in the least amount of moves so that a meeting near the barrels located in B3 code happen.

If this were a real life scenario and people on the ground had a printed map with grid lines, it would be easy for a control operator to share locations of key assets with those in the field without giving away detail over the airwaves.

Instead, ground users would simply marry up the points of interest, obstructions and team members from a simple image and draw them in locally to a map. This would give HUGE situational awareness while maintaining some level of mission privacy.

Here is the fourth image sent in the evening to give more ideas on that. If the goal of "SB" was to move to the smiley face in the shortest number of grid moves, it would be easy to do so. Overlaying a grid like this against a real map would be valuable and secure.

What is next for SSTV over FM and UNDR Net?

Bob KD2QAK has been talking about giving a presentation on map reading and orienteering with a compass at an upcoming Overlook Mountain Amateur Radio Club presentation night.

If this is possible to get scheduled before an upcoming Radio Direction Finding event on October 30th at Ferncliff Forest, its possible we can blend all three topics together to make a really fun event.

If we think back to how Nolan N2WU was able to use APRStt as a way to identify key locations as part of the West Point Triathlon or how Bob Bruninga WB4APR did a case study using grid overlay at a hamfest to help find people, maybe using SSTV is not too crazy after all!!

Hopefully this is all coming into picture now that amateur radio has some very unique ways to share photos, locations data and valuable information using nothing more than the most inexpensive handheld amateur radio like a Baofeng UV-5R and a smartphone, that may not have internet service but should already have useful applications on it such as ROBOT36, SSTV Encoder and many more which will also be covered in the future on UNDR Net.

Participating in UNDR Net & Activities

If you would like to register to be part of the upcoming RDF & BBQ which the OMARC club is sponsoring on October 30th 2021 at Ferncliff Forest and would like more information about what you may wish to prepare for, please use the contact form at hvdn.org/undr

Other Suggested Reading