so we ran a simulated disaster exercise through our local ARES group this past Saturday and honestly I wasnt prepared for how different it felt from just ragchewing or contesting. the scenario was a major flooding event that knocked out cell towers and we had to establish comms between the EOC, a couple of Red Cross shelters, and the hospital. on paper it sounds straightforward right

well it wasnt. first thing that happened was our net control guy had a family thing come up last minute so someone had to step in cold, and that person (not gonna name names lol) hadnt really practiced net control procedures much. traffic got jumbled fast, people were doubling up, and we had one station that just could not hear anybody because of some local noise issue that nobody had tested for beforehand. we lost probably 20 minutes just sorting that out.

the big lesson for me personally was that I had never actually tested my go-kit under real operating conditions. like I had everything packed and thought I was ready but when I actually set it up in the field my coax was too short to reach a good window position and I had forgotten a spare fuse for the rig. nothing catastrophic but in a real event those little things add up

anyone else done these exercises recently, curious what kinds of things caught you off guard the first time you participated in one of these. or if youre just getting into ARES and thinking about joining up, honestly just do it, the learning curve is worth it

yeah this is pretty much exactly why we do the drills honestly. our group had a similar situation a few years back where we thought we had solid coverage across the county and then the exercise revealed this giant dead zone right where one of the main shelters was supposed to be. we ended up having to relay everything through a third station which worked but added latency and confusion to the net. after that we actually drove around with a handheld and mapped out the problem areas before the next exercise.

the go-kit thing is real too. I keep a laminated checklist inside mine now because I kept forgetting small stuff. not glamorous but it works. the other thing I'd say is if your group doesnt do a formal debrief after every exercise, push for one. even just 20-30 minutes of everyone talking through what went wrong without it turning into a blame session is incredibly valuable. thats where the real learning happens in my experience.

im pretty new to all this, just got my general a few months ago and I've been thinking about getting involved with ARES but wasnt sure if I was experienced enough yet. reading this actually makes me feel like maybe jumping in sooner is better even if I dont know everything? I always assumed you had to be some kind of expert operator first before they'd want you involved in emergency comms stuff