Most public safety emergency communications systems, military communications and government emergency agencies are designed to perform in emergencies at any time of day or night. These emergency public services systems generally fulfill the demands placed on them by normal operating conditions or small emergencies and operate within their system design and boundaries. It is when emergency communication systems are expected to perform beyond their design capacity that amateur and professional radio operators volunteer emergency communications are considered as an essential public services alternate means of emergency communication.

In Part 97.1, the Federal Communication Commissions/FCC rules and regulations are designed to provide an amateur radio service having a fundamental purpose as expressed in the following:

(a) Recognition and enhancement of the value of the amateur service to the public as a voluntary noncommercial communication service, particularly with respect to providing emergency communications.

Amateur Radio Operator Emergency Services is an essential element of the "public interest, convenience or necessity" doctrine embodied in the Communications Act of 1934. With this in mind, the Amateur Radio Relay League/ARRL makes emergency communications an objective for its Field Organization, using Amateur Radio Emergency Services/ARES as its vehicle for accomplishing this task.

Part 97.407 of the FCC rules provides for RACES, Radio Amateur Civil Emergency Services. RACES is a special phase of amateur radio recognized by FEMA, that provides radio communications for civil preparedness purposes only, for local, regional or national civil emergencies. These types of emergencies are not limited to war time activity, but can include natural disasters such as fire, snow, wind, flood,tsunami, landslides, maritime, pandemic, medical, lose of power and earthquakes, including equipment failures.

Fort Ward Amateur Radio Club Emergency Services, recognizes Military Amateur Radio Services/MARS, Office of Emergency Management/OEM Division concurs with the Federal Emergency Management Agency/FEMA and the American Radio Relay League/ARRL in advocating dual registration in both the Amateur Radio Emergency Services/ARES organization and the Radio Amateur Civil Emergency Services/RACES organization. When operating under a DHS/ARES/RACES/MARS/FEMA/Red Cross, Salvation Army/Local Police and Fire Department activation, amateur radio operators are limited to specific frequencies and may only communicate with other emergency management organizations. By combining ARES, MARS, FEMA, DHS and RACES capacities under localize, statewide and international/national radio registry listing, thereby, inter grated roles may be switched to meet the emergency requirements of the situation as it develops.

IFort Ward Amateur Radio Club Emergency Services, are fortunate enough that the all emergency radio service organizations work well together to provide a secondary means of communications to public service and emergency radio management organizations national, statewide, regional and local. If you have similar emergency radio experiences or abilities with the same, or would like to share your experiences and expertise, please feel free to join Island Tower Amateur Radio Emergency Operator Services.

For more information about Fort Ward Amateur Radio Club Acidities, Community Engagements, Education Radio Services and Radio Emergency Service