Thread: Ares/races
View Single Post
Old 03-16-2014, 03:27 PM   #12
NN5I
Carl, nn5i
 
NN5I's Avatar
 
Join Date: Sep 2011
Location: Tallahassee, FL
Posts: 1,441
Default

In my dotage I no longer participate in these activities, although I did learn by doing (many decades ago) that they are worthwhile; for despite their wheel-spinning futility for the victims of disaster they give some hams a feeling of usefulness that they have never experienced before and may never experience again, lending color to drab lives. Although in most cases the feelings of uselessness are fully justified by reality, it is a blessing to ease them.

Besides, all that RF during Skywarn nets may serve to warm the airmasses and mitigate the ravages of the weather.

All the enthusiasm for damage assessment (after tornadoes, etc.) seems based upon a belief that, if the Red Cross and NOAA learn about a damaged building quickly, the roof will leak a little less. I confess that I do not understand how this works. To me it seems that learning it in ten seconds, or learning it in ten weeks, makes no difference at all -- especially for the Red Cross and NOAA, who aren't in the roof-repair business anyhow.

But, if NOAA and the Red Cross can get their jobs done free by others who even bear the expenses, they can look good at their jobs without taking the trouble of doing their jobs themselves.

Helping them with damage assessment does help them get their reports out. Although the reports don't appear until long after the houses are replaced, surely the poor mope who had to live in his car for six months will take solace in knowing that the flood of paperwork appears in ten months rather than a year.

But what do I know? I've been a ham for only a little longer than a half century.
__________________
-- Carl
NN5I is offline   Reply With Quote