"The Internet is cables, landlines, and satellites," says Rick DeVirgiliis (ND3B), an electronics technician for the U.S. Postal Service in King of Prussia. "That can go in a heartbeat. Look at Katrina."
In an era when some people no longer carry cash or own a manual can opener, "we're here to show that we can come out to the middle of nowhere, with no electrical wires, and communicate with people all over the country."
The ham is being modest. By day's end, one of his fellow operators will chat up an astronaut on the space station. Some hobby.
Ham to the rescue
Dick Moll (W3RM) is 79 but remains fluent in the Morse code he learned as a kid. To prove it, he writes my daughter's name on a piece of paper as a series of dots and dashes.
"Cool," Jane marvels, intrigued by any language she could use to keep secrets from her little brother.
Moll is a legend in the 100-member Phil-Mont Mobile Radio Club, having put his skills to use admirably during the 1955 flood along the Delaware River.
"My brother and I drove to Stroudsburg, where there were homes turned on their sides and no communication," he recalls. "A guy with an outboard motorboat took us across the rushing water, where we set up in the jail. I had Boy Scouts with walkie-talkies bringing me car batteries. Pretty soon I was in touch with Navy helicopters overhead sending search parties to find survivors and the dead."
Today, Pennsylvania's Emergency Management Agency director considers the state's 23,000 operators licensed by the Federal Communications Commission "a partner" in times of crisis.
Hence this Field Day operation at Fort Washington State Park, where members of the Phil-Mont Club, based in Abington, ready for hurricane, hailstorm, or hacker.
Speaking in tongues
