This weekend is ARRL Field Day!
What are your plans?
When: 4th Weekend Of June (24-25)
Where: Find your local field day site
What is Field Day?
Field Day is ham radio’s open house. Every June, more than 40,000 hams throughout North America set up temporary transmitting stations in public places to demonstrate ham radio’s science, skill and service to our communities and our nation. It combines public service, emergency preparedness, community outreach, and technical skills all in a single event. Field Day has been an annual event since 1933, and remains the most popular event in ham radio.
I’m coordinator this year for CVARC, and we’ll be operating an 18A setup. I tell you, it’s been a job for several months getting it together. With some luck I may get to actually use a radio during the event.
How do you persuade that many people to get involved? How big is your club? My club has about 150 on the roster, and only eight people have expressed an interest in Field Day.
Hard to give a specific answer, but it’s an extremely active club of close to 200 members. Several sub-groups, new members encouraged to take part in leadership, and we’re in a very healthy area for ham radio. I think the big deal on FD is more a result of having a lot of activities the rest of the year. Historically, it’s always been a huge day for us (before my time, they ran as a 23A once) I also run another group (not a club) that puts on a monthly field day open to all the clubs in the area, so a lot of locals are in the habit of doing portable HF already.
There’s a real culture within the club that if someone wants a certain event, they just jump in and create it.