Next weekend, 16th & 17th October is Exercise Blue Ham.
Anyone taking part? Anyone done it before? How’d it go?
It’ll be my first time taking part after encouragement from a ham who’s recently joined the squadron.
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We’ve run it before and the cadets enjoyed it. There were lots of amateurs making contact and it kept the cadets busy talking, logging and working out where the other stations were.
I don’t think we can run it this year as the RAFAC COVID guidance still limits cadets to ‘handheld radio use only, no shared microphones’.
If only you could clean the microphone
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Yeah I’ve elected to just ignore that bit about handheld only, and the regionradio bod has issued my Sqn a callsign so it’s going ahead.
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Now you’re being logical and sensible. HQAC haven’t thought of that yet.
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Put a thin plastic bag over the mic the type supermarkets used or give you for the veggies is ideal, change bag between operators. A bit of a faff but it works (easier if you have a desktop mic than one the CB radio hand mics)
Just noticed this on the Blue Ham website 
:
If you transmit out-of-band: the Men-in-Black will take you from your home in the middle of the night to a secret base where you will be strapped to a chair in a sound-proof room and made to watch every episode of Coronation Street. Allegedly!
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Blue Ham 2022 has been announced publicly for the weekend 26 and 27 March 2022.
Who’s going to take part? 
Why is this on a random website and not a SharePoint announcement? 
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quite . . .
yadda yadda yadda rubbish HQ Comms yadda yadda yadda
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The Alpha Charlie announcement is for radio hams, there should be a cascade down via RRCOs / WRCOs
The National event listing on the Radio Portal hasn’t been updated yet to feature any 2022 events
It’s February tomorrow
Alpha Charlie has been in use i predict longer than Sharepoint and was a “go to” place for all things ATC radio (except the confidential stuff) in its peak.
Forgive me for a slight hijacking of a thread, but it was the most recent radio related one and therefore seemed most appropriate.
ACTO 73 states theres a blanket ban on PMR446 type radios, I’m just curious as to why?
Because all our communications should be on the allocated Cadet Frequencies.
I thought this ban was for cadets only, and that staff can use them?
I wasn’t sure, so checked the acto.
“PMR446 radios must not be used for cadet training or on any MoD property”, so depends how much you want to argue the wiggle room.
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Well it’s fairly clear that “RAFAC callsigns are MoD property and shall not be used on non-MoD radio frequencies” so unless your operating as “Hey Joe, could you do X for me” which of course would be rather poor comms and shouldn’t be done in earshot of cadets, then you gotta use programmable radios.
We’ve used this when driving in convoy before… 
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lol we all do it, but shouldn’t.
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