With Cyclone Gaja hurtling towards Cuddalore and Pamban around Nagapattinam, Ham radio operators from Bengaluru and Kollam in Kerala are in Cuddalore district for transmission of information from base stations to government departments. The district administration has set up the Ham Radio Communication Headquarters on the Collectorate campus.
Four operators from the Bangalore Amateur Radio Club, who arrived on Thursday, are stationed at the Collectorate while another group from Kollam-based Active Hams Amateur Radio Society has been sent to Chidambaram as a precautionary measure. The team from Active Hams Amateur Radio Society recently participated in the Kerala flood rescue operations and transmitted emergency communication during floods.
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The team reached Cuddalore on Thursday to handle any emergency communication on the request of the district authorities. According to Govind Girimigi, Secretary of Amateur Radio Society of India whose call sign prefix is VU2GGM, “nine ham operators have been stationed in vulnerable areas across the district to report disaster. We take orders from the officials concerned and communicate to the relief camps on VHF 145000 MHZ,” he said.
(VU3VRL) Ramesh, another ham operator and treasurer of Bangalore Amateur Radio Club, said when secondary levels of communication fail and the authorities were restricted to particular channels in an emergency, ham radios step in to function as an alternative means of communication. “We have the liberty to shift within our own battery set up and communicate until the first line of communication is restored,” he said.
The Cuddalore district administration has launched FM Radio 107.8 to ensure uninterrupted transmission of information if other modes of communication fail.
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