SKYWARN Newsletter #22

Hello to all...

SKYWARN Training Update...
Icing Caused Major Accidents 1/31...
Sending the SKYWARN Document to Those Who Couldn't Attend the Meeting...
APRS Documentation Series...
Possible New SKYWARN Net in the Greater Boston Metro Area Update...

SKYWARN Training Update...

We now have a confirmed training session in Walpole and here is a
"press" release of sorts from W1ZSA-Roger Turner, Walpole EMA Director.

SKYWARN Training Session to take place Thursday, May 1, 1997 from 7 - 10
PM Newell Center, Senior Citizen's Room, Walpole Town Hall, 135 School 
St., Walpole, MA.

Walpole Emergency Management is pleased to host our second annual SKYWARN 
training program.  Our speaker and instructor is Glen Field, Senior 
Warning Coordinator Meteorologist, Forecaster, SKYWARN instructor, 
National Weather Service, Taunton.  The entire evening will be devoted to 
SKYWARN training.  The session will consist of lecture, videos and other 
training material.  The doors will be open at 6 p.m. 

You will learn how to:
  Observe and report destructive and severe, unusual or abnormal weather 
  conditions.
  Estimate wind speed by interpreting tree motion.
  Recognize the dangerous portion of thunderstorms, tornadoes and what 
  safety measures should be taken.

Mr. Field will also discuss and show interesting photographs of the Great 
Barrington and Worcester tornadoes, and the Brockton - Whitman area 
downburst of last summer.

SKYWARN is a program sponsored by the National Weather Service.  This 
program teaches volunteers to be weather observers for reporting 
destructive storms or other severe, unusual or abnormal weather 
conditions.  Ground reports from SKYWARN observers used in conjunction 
with radar observations may lead the National Weather Service to issue 
Severe Weather Warnings.  Ground reports also help to validate forecasts.  
When the potential for severe weather exists, often when a severe weather 
watch is issued, volunteers are alerted through various means such as NOAA 
weather radio or the telephone.  SKYWARN is generally activated any time 
when thunderstorms or other severe weather conditions are predicted in the 
forecast.  Other key words to listen for are: Damaging Winds, Strong 
Winds, and Hail.

This program should be of special interest to those who are interested in 
the weather, is an active outdoors person, interested in public safety 
and/or public service.  Trained Amateur Radio operators are of particular 
value during time of severe weather conditions.

This program is being sponsored by The National Weather Service, 
Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency - Area 2, Walpole Emergency 
Management, the Norwood Amateur Radio Club, and the Norfolk County Radio 
Association.  This meeting is open to everyone; however, space is limited.

For additional information and pre-registration contact Roger Turner, 
Director, Walpole Emergency Management(W1ZSA), at 508-668-2237.

Radio Amateur's can be talked in on 146.895/295.

Direction to the Newell Center, Walpole Town Hall, 135 School St., 
Walpole.  School St. runs between Rt. 27 (which is East St.) and Common 
St. and is parallel to Rt. 1A.

Walpole is about halfway between Boston and Providence and is easily 
reached from Rt. 1A, Rt. 1, Rt. 95, and Rt. 27.

From Boston:  Travel south on Rt. 95 to Coney St. (exit 10 Sharon 
Walpole).  At the top of the ramp turn right (Coney St.).  At the set of 
lights turn left onto Rt. 1. (south).  At Rt. 27 (the next set of lights) 
turn right.  (**)At Rt. 27, High Plain St. Walpole, proceed through the 
first set of lights at Washington St., continue through the stop sign, 
bear left onto East St.  Then past the Catholic Church on the left.  The 
2nd cross Street. is School St.  Take left at School St., the town hall is 
the next large building on the right.  There is plenty of parking in the 
rear of the building and the adjacent lot.

From Attleboro take Rt. 95 North to Rt.1 (exit 9 Rt. 1 and 27 Walpole) and 
proceed no Rt. 1 North.  The next set of lights is Rt. 27 (High Plain 
St.).  Take left and follow instructions noted above (**).  

From Medfield take Rt. 27 to Walpole Center.  Go through the set of lights 
at Main St.(Rt. 1A) and East St. (Rt. 27).  At the first intersection take 
a right, School St. the Town Hall is the big building on the right.

Currently, there has been no other changes to the SKYWARN training
schedule at present. We are still waiting for confirmation of May
24th from Noon to 3 PM at the Falmouth Town Hall from Vice President,
N1SNH, Henry Brown. We are awaiting dates to utilize the Brockton
VA Hospital and the Nashua Town Hall for SKYWARN training through
Carl N1FYZ, and KA1GOZ Don, and KC1ED, Dave respectively. Middlesex
County SKYWARN training is being worked on between Carl N1FYZ attempting
to contact the VA Hospital in Bedford and me contacting Glenn
Field's contact in Littleton for SKYWARN training in that region.
Awaiting another site and date from Rick Fairweather, K1KYI, and Martin
Mendelson, N1JMA, for Western Rhode Island.

Icing Caused Major Accidents 1/31...

Freezing Drizzle that fell during much of the day caused major
travel problems across Eastern Massachusetts. Many accidents
were reported across Interstate 495, and 128. I was travelling
during this event and many accidents were on 495 with the road
apparently blocked off to traffic for a time in the Franklin area.
I made several contacts on the 146.64 Waltham and 146.865 Sharon
repeaters to alert people to the hazards and snarled traffic on
I 495, and then reported the icy conditions to NWS Taunton.
The icing snarled travel, and based on spotter reports from myself
and many others, a winter weather advisory was issued due to the
situation. Things improved by Saturday Morning as the precipitation
stopped and the temperatures warmed up.

Sending the SKYWARN Document to Those Who Couldn't Attend the Meeting...

Due to some unforseen obstacles, I was unable to send out any
of the documents to area weather spotters. I plan on completing
the distribution of these documents by the third week in February,
with the first set being issued towards the end of this week.

APRS Documentation Series...

Here is the second part in the APRS Document Series:

Date: Tue, 26 Nov 96 09:02:00 EST
Message-ID: <2495@WB7VMS> (52597@AA1FS) 
From: KC7LVZ@WB7VMS
To: APRS@USA
Subject: An Intro to APRS Part 2 of 4
Path: AA1FS!KC1CE!KA1RCI!WG1I!K1UGM!WB1DSW!W0RLI!KC7KFE ...

STAYING ON TRACK

         With the advent of the Global Positioning System, or GPS, APRS
has matured into an accurate and useful means of tracking moving
stations in real time.  As mentioned above, this concept was used
early in the history of APRS to track contestants in a cross-
country marathon.  Since then, the ability of APRS to decode the
NMEA-0183 GPS serial protocol data has allowed hams to track the
movements of mobile and portable stations, and locate stations in
remote areas.
         Locating a transmitter is made easy using DF equipment and
APRS.  Antenna azimuth readings and signal strengths adjusted for
antenna gain are entered into the system via keyboard.  The
operator can then draw a circle the radius of which is proportional
to the signal strength, or use the azimuth and signal strength
readings to plot a point on the map.  Points are plotted or circles
drawn using similar data from other APRS stations.  If three or
more circles or plots intersect, the transmitter is close to that
intersection.  Just the thing for locating a jammer.
         APRS can also receive data in real time from weather stations
such as those made by Davis and Peet Brothers.  The data include
wind speed and direction, temperature, hourly and daily rainfall
amounts, and sometimes barometric pressure.  If the data from
enough weather stations is included on an APRS map, a good picture
can be made of an area's weather conditions.  Obviously, this could
come in very handy when the weather turns nasty.
         APRS has shown that it can be very useful to participants in
the SKYWARN program.  By using weather data obtained from APRS,
they can provide much more information on storm development,
evolution, and movement than they would be able to provide by using
the equipment they have on hand at their individual QTH.  Better
still is the potential ability to track a storm.
         By sending mobile APRS/GPS stations out to the periphery of
a storm where visual observations can be safely made, the location
and movement of many kinds of weather disturbances, including
hurricanes, tornadoes, and large thunderstorms, can be monitored. 
Once the direction of a storm has been determined, an estimate of
its path can be made, and warnings issued to those on its projected
path to prepare for its arrival.
         Since LORAN also uses the NMEA-0183 protocol, APRS can be used
to aid in navigation by using the long-established LORAN system. 
Boaters and pilots are the obvious beneficiaries, as are those
adventurers that are equipped for LORAN, but lack GPS capability. 

THE TOY BOX

         So what do you need to get started in APRS?  All you need is
your packet station and the APRS software, which is freely
available as shareware.  If you can access the Internet, the
address is:

        ftp://ftp.tapr.org/tapr/SIG/aprssig/files/upload

On the World Wide Web, the address is:

          hhtp://www.tapr.org/sigs/aprssig/files/upload

A recent version for DOS is APRS77D.ZIP.  For Windows users, there
is Winaprs 1.10.  These programs are rather large because of the
maps that they provide, so be sure you have enough storage space
on your disk before you start.  Another source is one of the many
ham-related BBSs that have a version of the APRS software freely
available for downloading from the hard drive.
         Your APRS station can have virtually any level of complexity
you can afford, from an IBM compatible 8086 computer to the latest
Pentium-powered full-size and laptop machines.  You should have a
hard drive in your machine, and a color monitor, but a monochrome
monitor will work.  Some hams go a step farther, and use the GATE
function to crossband digipeat APRS data on HF with a complete
packet system dedicated for that purpose alone.  Others set up
mobile APRS stations, so they can respond to changing events.

                       - End of Part 2 -

73 de Larry KC7LVZ @ WB7VMS.#MURPH.OR.USA.NOAM


Possible New SKYWARN Net in the Greater Boston Metro Area Update...

I have been given an update with regards of the potential new net
on the 145.47 Danvers Repeater. Phil Night, N1HWA, reported to me
that the Repeater trustee has approved use of the repeater and that
the NSRA board will meet Monday Night for final approval of having
SKYWARN on 145.47. More information to follow as needed.

That concludes this week's edition of the SKYWARN Newsletter,
Comments, Questions, or Suggestions are always welcome. The next
SKYWARN Newsletter will be issued in the February 9th-10th timeframe.

Respectfully Submitted,

Robert Macedo (KD1CY)
ARES SKYWARN Coordinator
Greater New Bedford ARES Emergency Coordinator
Home Phone #: (508) 994-1875
Home/Data #: (508) 997-4503
Work Phone #: (508) 435-1000 Ext.: 3411
Email Address: rmacedo@ma.ultranet.com
Packet Address: KD1CY @ AA1FS
http://www.ultranet.com/~rmacedo

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