Great ShakeOut Earthquake Drills – October 15th at 10:15. There will be an ARES net with voice reports on this repeater. Lodi ARC repeater. Reports can also or additionally be sent by Winlink RMS to N6ZDH, or by regular email to N6ZDH@winlink.org. The script for the drill can be found here.

The RATPAC web site has an EMCOM zoom presentation tomorrow at 18:00 hrs (6:00PM) entitled “2026 Amatuer Radio ShakeOut – Preparedness for Everyone”. The presenter is Oliver Dully K6OLI. There are other interesting videos of previous presentations that RATPAC keeps links to on their site. The Watch Duty video was mentioned on our zoom call last week but I would also like to point out “Is GMRS a Viable Emcomms Platform” by Dan Lundwal. I found it informative and especially the focus on our own family communication plans.

The Digital packet net will start next week on Tuesday and commence at 18:30 hours, prior to our ARES voice net. (145.070 MHz) Anyone who would like help in setting up their station should contact me by email and we can set up a time to make that happen.

Pacificon is coming up on the 16th of October and there are some presentations dealing with EmComm, including “Rethinking Amateur Radio Emergency Serivces” by Bruce Perens, K6BP and “Watch Duty: Behind the Scenes” by Sara Paul.

I will be giving a short introductory presentation on LoRa and Meshtastic at the next Lodi Club meeting on October 1st. If you have an interest in LoRa radio and what can be done with Meshtastic, please attend. Coincidentally, QST magazine had the cover story about the subject in the October edition.

Also noteworthy in the October issue is the article “Future-Proofing ARES: Collaborating with GMRS Operators”