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Tour Logo
Downtown Paris
EOC Operators
Civic Center
APRS Map
On July 21, 2018, the Tour de Paris started at 0800 CT with temperatures at 82 deg F and a humidity of 75{b7e846ec21166e47ccdc10129d105476ba0c4361c57e0c2b36f83efb841c2c7f} equated to a heat index at the starting line at about 85. At about 1530 CT, when NCS closed the net after the last rider came through the finish line, it was 105 deg with heat index at 112 deg F. It was a hot one!
EMS units, Fire departments, Sheriff’s deputies, Police officers, rest stop sponsors and ham radio volunteers were all hands on deck, prepared with months of planning! After a not so smooth start with a couple of medical calls in just the first hour of the rally, sag wagons, EMS volunteers and hams all were busy with sag duties and heat exhaustion patients.
In the end, all riders and volunteers were accounted for and doing well.
EOC operations were manned by WA5KZA, N5JEP, KE5JPM, N5DDS and K5KEY. Our window to the rally was truly the aprs.fi maps which show real-time location of units using APRS and were shown on the EOCs large information display. Sag wagons K5BLY, KG5FCQ were tracked live using the KF5HKI-10 portable digipeater, WN5ROC EOC digipeater, and AF5WO’s home digipeater/igate. We look forward to next year. I hope that APRS will be more common place in this effort next year.
Kelly, W5KJC, Frank, KG5DXT and Sue, KG5DXU manned the Civic Center with a table front and center in the foyer of the venue! Kudos to them for putting a live presence to the ham radio effort at the most influential locations we could ever ask for in the rally.
Our Rest stop operators and sag wagons were instrumental as well for health and safety issue at and near the rest stops along the paths. I really do appreciate all they did to get requests out fast from their locations.
As President of the Red River Valley ARC, I would like to thank all the volunteers and public safety officials for their hard work and skills to ensure a successful and safe rally!
See you next year!
73s
-Leo Salas, N5JEP