WICEN Vic: WICEN in The Future

Wed Feb 5 04:03:26 CST 2020

There was an item on  ABC Radio Australia Wide this afternoon highlighting
NSW WICEN activities!
Regards
Paul
VK3FPDA

On Wed, 5 Feb 2020 at 19:51, Mark Cheeseman (lists) <
mark-lists at cheeseman.org> wrote:

> Hi Graham,
>
> I was not involved in this year's fires myself but was at an unofficial
> "debrief" over the weekend and heard accounts from VK2 members who were on
> the front line, at least as "front line" as WICEN should be, including some
> who worked in fire control centres. Your point about our skills in log
> keeping is a relevant one, and one of operators' consistent observations
> was that the WICEN operators were much more comfortable with log keeping at
> speed than other operators. Their training is at a much slower pace whereas
> we do it all the time in the events that we participate in throughout the
> year and that would be true of WICEN operators around the country. WICEN
> operators are quite comfortable driving the radio and logging at the same
> time, whereas other agencies often have a radio operator and a separate log
> keeper. The fact that WICEN could keep up while not compromising log
> accuracy did not go unnoticed by the incident controllers, particularly
> when things got busy.
>
> There was a lot of other WICEN involvement in the fires here and it's a
> pity that the CFA didn't take advantage of the availability of operators in
> VK3 as they did here. One of the things that has helped us gain visibility
> and trust of the emergency services in NSW has been our involvement with
> the VRA. This is an umbrella group over a number of specialist volunteer
> groups, including both WICEN and CREST NSW. As a result, we have a better
> channel into emergency planning than we would as an individual group.
>
> Another thing that has helped us has been our strategy of acquiring some
> commercial channels and equipment. This has allowed us to build systems
> that can be operated by non-amateurs, so increasing our flexibility to
> deploy comms systems where we can't provide enough operators, or where it
> is impractical to put a WICEN operator at each location, such as vehicles
> that are already full. This helped us in the Bega fire, where
> infrastructure damage meant the VRA (who were supporting the RFS) lost
> their own repeater in that area, as well as mobile phone coverage and
> repeaters of other services in the area. The fact that we had a mobile
> midband repeater ready to roll, that could operate on channels present in
> radios already in the vehicles, meant that we were able to give them a
> working radio network in around a day with no need for a heap of operators.
> Because of WICEN's non-profit status, we are able to obtain channels at no
> cost as you would no doubt also be able to. The challenge is finding free
> channels 🙂
>
> Your comment about interstate collaboration is also one that I think is
> worth exploring by all WICENs. The reason I joined this list in the first
> place was when we were trying to organise some VK2 operators to go to VK3
> many years ago, and it was quicker and easier at the time to communicate
> this way. That transfer ultimately fell through because the wheels of
> bureaucracy moved too slowly to be able to confirm that our operators would
> have appropriate insurance. As things happened, a fewf operators made the
> decision to wear the risk themselves and did end up travelling to VK3. We
> had a similar situation this year where a number of operators from VK1
> helped us out on the Bega fire. In this case, the wheels moved much more
> quickly and they received appropriate coverage. Amazing how quickly things
> can move when the shoe is on the other foot and we are the ones seeking
> help! Given how long these agreements can take to get in place, the time to
> start the ball rolling is well before we need them.
>
> I can't speak for the current committee but they are all reasonable
> people, so I can't imagine why they would be opposed to such interstate
> collaboration. There is an opportunity for more informal collaboration
> already on the unofficial WICEN Facebook page but there is a need IMHO for
> more formal channels to be established, to work through issues such as
> interstate operator exchange. I have been around long enough (and there are
> plenty who have been around longer than me) to remember when we had a
> national WICEN coordinator within the WIA, however he was never replaced
> when he stood down. Since then a lot has changed - WIA has moved from a
> federal model to the national model, WIA seems to have less interest in
> WICEN in general (at least, that is my outsider impression as I am no
> longer a member of WIA), legislation has changed probably everywhere,
> emergency management in each state has evolved, and fire seasons are
> getting longer. I personally think now is as good a time as any to try to
> re-establish those inter-state links where possible.
>
> Apologies for the length of this post but there is a lot to talk about,
> and the fire season isn't even over yet. And apologies in advance for any
> grammatical errors above - I haven't had time to re-read this email as I
> need to go an feed the family!
>
> Cheers and 73,
> Mark VK2XGK
>
> ------------------------------
> *From:* wicenvic <wicenvic-bounces at vic.wicen.org.au> on behalf of Graham
> & Kay Mason <mason.group at iinet.net.au>
> *Sent:* Tuesday, 4 February 2020 10:03 AM
> *To:* WICEN Victoria <secretary at vic.wicen.org.au>
> *Cc:* WICEN EMail List <wicenvic at vic.wicen.org.au>
> *Subject:* Re: WICEN Vic: WICEN in The Future
>
> 
> Hi All
>
> I have been reading the mail with discussion on our future involvement in
> emergencies in Victora and I comment on Training and National information
> sharing.
>
> Training
> Some of the discussion so far has suggested that we should undertake
> training to operate equipment for other agencies. ( SES  CFA and the like
> ). I do not believe that this is relevant to our operation even if we are
> called to operate in ICC’s or Opperation Rooms in the future.
> Reflecting on the past I have been activated to work in ICC’s and a
> Forward Control Communication Centre, and my experience was that the radio
> was set up on a particular channel and my only interface with the system
> was the microphone and the PTT. My job was to *handle messages and *keep
> a log. In the Ovens ICC I had some shifts where I monitored a phone and I
> was required to *handle messages and keep a log.*
> In King Lake in a CFA forward control van I was required to* handle
> messages and keep a log.* The only interface with the radio equipment was
> the microphone and the PTT.
> The point I make is that it is not nessesery to train to use other
> agencies radio equipment, our expertise is as message handlers and log
> keepers and that is reflected in our training package.
> That is not to say that we shouldn’t expand and update our training. It
> would be helpful to add CFA procedures and pro words. These were circulated
> to WICEN members in the past but not actually included in our training.
>
> National I formation Shairing
> I accept that the various WICEN groups are state based ( although there is
> a national coordinator who ever that is) but I now see that there should be
> formal discussion between them. In our current fire season we have seen NSW
> called to perform the same rolls that Wicen Vic have performed in the past,
> but in Vic we were not called. In Queensland their fire service has
> employed a professional training organisation to train and qualify (and I
> expect licence) hundreds of their fire fighters as Ameteur Radio Operators.
> This seems to be some sort of reverse thinking.
> I think the time has come for some formal interstate discussion and
> information sharing to see how we can help each other into the future
> understanding of our roll.
>
> Graham Mason
> VK3KMG
>
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> wicenvic at vic.wicen.org.au
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>
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