Anyone Work Comms for Boston Marathon?

[chaser001]

Got treated to a military fly by in Wellesley this morning. A couple of F18s I think (didn't get a great look) at fairly low altitude

F15s, they came over Hopkinton before the Star Spangled Banner was over, flying at 1k feet.

 

[cockpitbob]

You know, I thought they looked like 15s, but I thought most had been retired. Love how they sound like they are tearing the air.

 

[vicorjh]

Phew! Just rolled in 6:30PM. Nice work all.

The F15s were cool to see.

 

[Love Machine]

Interesting radio calls about a blind runner that somehow lost his guide. No problem though. The blind guy is still going

That guide was on our bus - they felt faint and got transported to Copley. After which some bricks were shit and we were instructed not to pick up anyone who's not a runner, though picking up the guide was the right thing to do. Did the blind guy finish?

 

[Love Machine]

Also, was it just me or did everyone have absolute shit luck with T3 and T1? T2 was the only reliable channel for me, though apparently other could hear what I had to say on those channels.

 

[cockpitbob]

That guide was on our bus - they felt faint and got transported to Copley. After which some bricks were shit and we were instructed not to pick up anyone who's not a runner, though picking up the guide was the right thing to do. Did the blind guy finish?

I can't figure out the thinking here. The Blind Runner Guides have bibs, are officially allowed to participate in the race and why TF would you not give someone with a bib and that's feeling faint a ride?

I never heard what happened to the blind runner but I could hear the bricks being shit Props to the runner. He's a big boy and can make his own decisions.

 

[cockpitbob]

Also, was it just me or did everyone have absolute shit luck with T3 and T1? T2 was the only reliable channel for me, though apparently other could hear what I had to say on those channels.

E.D., aside from the comms problems, what's your take on how the buss system worked? This is my 4th year working mid-course, and again I don't have anything good to say. My only exposure is from listening to metical tent M07. They called the Med/Hydration net saying "we have one waiting for a bus". All that net could tell them is "The busses just run their loops and you just have to wait. There's no need to make a call and we don't have any information to give you." An hour later M07 called saying they hadn't seen a bus yet. After a total of 1.5hrs they called saying they had 10 runners waiting (and chilling down) and still hadn't seen a bus. All net control could say was there's nothing they can do and they don't have any information for them. I never did hear how long the first runner waited before the bus finally showed up.

 

[Love Machine]

The M07 I believe was a medic waiting for a bus. One of the tent medics had to be replaced by a bus medic, then the bus medic had to be picked up. I could not for the life of me communicate with T3 or T1, I dunno if I fudged the frequencies or what, although sometimes T3 cut through. I think organizationally things could be improved, for example net control didn't keep track of the number of people being picked up and we needed to - so there would be enough express buses waiting at the rendez-vous points.

But the root cause of that is also the absence of hams - I was the only ham operator of the 3 express buses at Babson in the beginning, so there was traffic on the Motorola radios that should have been on ham and things got confusing since the drivers aren't proper radio operators. When you've multiple channels and people talking about things, that created more confusion than anything I think.

 

[DispositionMatrix]

I heard a net in operation around 1720 yesterday. "Express [n]" appeared to be the tactical call signs for the transport vehicles. The net controller seemed to keep it together despite being frustrated by operators over modulating, speaking too quickly, and rushing the repeater.

 

[vicorjh]

Also, was it just me or did everyone have absolute shit luck with T3 and T1? T2 was the only reliable channel for me, though apparently other could hear what I had to say on those channels.

Several of the transport hams switched from T1 to T2 early in the day which net control handled admirably. Good move and quick thinking on the transport hams part. It sounds as though whatever was going on was resolved sometime in the afternoon. From what I understand, the T1 set-up had changed either from last year or from some ICS revision. Perhaps this was part of the issue. Or, there was simply a general issue with the repeater. I was able to monitor on T1 early in the morning before switching to my assigned repeater and I didn't notice anything unusual at the time. But, I stopped monitoring once underway.
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Also, one ham (at a medical tent) noted (in general) that operating wideband was subject to a great deal of blocking/interference on his rig which he mitigated by going narrow. At the time, I was running a d74a and didn't experience those same issues while in wideband. The d74a has pretty good specs for an HT which I assume mitigated some of those issues (not that wideband was needed).
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Traffic on T2 was heavy for about an hour during the peak of the afternoon runners. Fair amount of doubles. I did not hear any EMS requests on the T2 net. Documentation was in conflict as to using MEMA vs net control as first contact for EMS request.
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At one point, it appears some medical tents were complaining that the medical transports would call on location but then the staff could not find the transport (claiming the transport was not there). I thought about this for a bit this morning and realized there seems to be some procedural problems in the documented (and undocumented) process that should be discussed with the planning folk at some point. It appears that this has been an issue in past years. The documentation has a band-aid solution (perhaps not realistic) which probably could be resolved with some alteration to the communication procedure (e.g. don't call arrival information until stepping out of the van). And, ensure that the ham checks-in with the Malpha when at each stop. Malpha, should likewise, then verify/coordinate with the medical coordinator as to status.

On the other-hand, the transports certainly were there. They didn't just disappear into the vapor and stop by the local watering hole. So, if the medical staff are expecting a transport they should also be clearly communicating this with the local ham on station. One case, the local medical staff were holding a runner and did not want to put him on a transport, yet. All non-emergency. Instead they wanted to hold the runner for an indeterminate amount of time. Ok. A second station, nearby, indicated a runner was ready for immediate transport. Local HAM and van EMTs decide that we should go and pick up the second station runner. We picked-up the second station and returned to the first. About ten to fifteen minutes round trip. First station medical staff was clearly angry now in a passive aggressive sort of way. Not answering questions, ignoring the EMTs with the van trying to assist the runner, not looking at us, etc. A chink in the picture of teamwork. Stress? Attitude? Overloaded? What gives? Should net control have told us to stay on station? Did net control even know? Did the local ham know?
Not to mention, once the runner is on one of these (non-emergency) medical transports, they could be shuttled around upwards of an hour.
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[cockpitbob]

EvilDragon, what loop was your bus running and how long did one circuit take?


Also, what's the communications path from, for instance, from a medical tent to you?

Last year I was at a med tent and we would call in requests for transport on a Course channel, not Transport. Supposedly that would get relayed to Transportation Net Control and to the bus, but the bus driver took orders from the bus company dispatch. This year, listening to Course Net Control, Med-07 was told to just wait, that Course Net Control couldn't put in a request and didn't have any information on the bus locations or schedules. It sounded like the busses just ran their loops and the radios were only for location status.

 

[vicorjh]

"An hour later M07 called saying they hadn't seen a bus yet. After a total of 1.5hrs they called saying they had 10 runners waiting (and chilling down) and still hadn't seen a bus. All net control could say was there's nothing they can do and they don't have any information for them. I never did hear how long the first runner waited before the bus finally showed up."

Wow, something certainly wrong there. I wonder if this is accurate.
Net should, at minimum, know when a transport is on station. Is this response from one of the course nets or transport nets?

As a side note, I had one query for information to the net. Didn't get far. I don't think they are set-up/staffed to handle much outside of the script. Or, there are too many points of failure when going off script.

And, if there is an urgent need (10 runners would be urgent in my mind), you would think the transport net should be able to engage in direction/queries (even at the risk of annoying the commercial dispatch).

 

[cockpitbob]

Actually, very long delays for busses seems like the norm for me. Here's some posts from my time at Med-06 last year where an Elite Runner had to wait almost 2 hrs for the Elite transport bus and regular runners had to wait 2 hrs (scroll down to post #5). Our requests seemed to get lost.

But again, this year Course Net Control was telling Med-07 that there is no making requests for a bus, you just wait for them to get to you on their loop. I suppose I could go back to the Documentation web page and read the Transport Segment Communications Plan to see what's supposed to happen.

 

[vicorjh]

I heard a net in operation around 1720 yesterday. "Express [n]" appeared to be the tactical call signs for the transport vehicles. The net controller seemed to keep it together despite being frustrated by operators over modulating, speaking too quickly, and rushing the repeater.

Yes, the net controllers were great! Kept me calm Everyone out on course were trying their best.

The transport net uses a "hybrid" exchange which, essentially, attempts to reduce the number of times you need to key up in order to convey your information. Add to that, the heavy traffic at times, variable location, variable radio set-ups, then yea; not great.

Bus [x] would be transport vans that move between medical tents, etc.
Bus [x] van drops off runners to Express [x] at one of several staging areas. Express [x] would then move bulk runners to the finish area, etc.

All of this transport takes some time for these runners (some of which have no choice but to leave their breakfast behind). The runners get blankets, water, medical attention all the way through but after running many miles, it can not be comfortable to be sitting on a bus for an extended period.

 

[Love Machine]

EvilDragon, what loop was your bus running and how long did one circuit take?

I was on the express bus from Babson to Copley. The only ham amongst the three buses there. 33 minutes to Copley, 25 minutes back to Babson. It was also discouraging to hear net control tell the shuttle buses not to announce how many people they picked up because it was important for us! We would stay around an extra five minutes to load up a sweep van if it was out on M08 or later and was carrying passengers. This was not known to the other two buses, so they left as they could or if they could get any info on the incoming load using the Motorola radios.

 

[vicorjh]

"It was also discouraging to hear net control tell the shuttle buses not to announce how many people they picked up"

Yeah, this is interesting. Net control was actively working to discourage announcing the number of runners on the vans. This was contrary to the documented procedure.

On the buses, at one point we tried to get an idea of the express schedule as well so that we could make sure we made it to the staging area before they left. Net was unable to tell us. It was all hope and see.

Our driver got upset at one point when I called ahead to a station to see if they had runners waiting (station had asked me to do so). Said he did it on the commercial radio. Not sure who he spoke to...

Perhaps there is a longer term plan of action underway regarding ham support. In particular when radio duties seem to be mostly for providing statistics.

 

[Love Machine]

As soon as I boarded the bus, my driver handed me the Motorola on the TransAction frequency. The drivers and medics are not interested in doing radio duty and we're hamstrung from doing it. So what gives?

 

[vicorjh]

As soon as I boarded the bus, my driver handed me the Motorola on the TransAction frequency. The drivers and medics are not interested in doing radio duty and we're hamstrung from doing it. So what gives?

Wish I knew. This was a fun support effort, I did feel like I was contributing in a nominal way, it was great chance to practice in a high noise environment with variable amounts of net traffic, and it reminds you of the importance of not making assumptions (affirmative communication). I do, however, think the hams/net supporting the transport effort could have been given a greater responsibility in the organization of the flow of transport runners.

 

[ghettomedic]

First, let me start by asking that you PLEASE send after event reports to Contact @ Hamradioboston.org We need your feedback from the field so we can make adjustments next year. Of course you could just work for START where everything was planned and executed perfectly

Yes, those were F15s, they went over the start line at 09:49 and were very loud going over our comms trailer.

As for the blind runners guide, he DOES qualify as a runner and should be picked up by the bus however spectators and volunteers should not.

The buses do run on loops and the med tent is supposed to keep an eye on the bus stop to visualize their arrival. Also the bus is supposed to call arriving 2 minutes before arrival to provide enough time to relay the message between the nets. However, as stated by others, the bus company insists in being in complete control of all their assets directly and therefore it is hard to get them to follow our plans.

 

[Love Machine]

Yeah, I'll def be filling out event reports. I've no problems with them being in control of their assets, it's more that there needs to be one system for communicating.

 

[ghettomedic]

Yeah, I'll def be filling out event reports. I've no problems with them being in control of their assets, it's more that there needs to be one system for communicating.

Agreed, I did transport the last 2 years and there was horrible communication between the bus company and amateur radio as well as them doing their own thing separate from the BAA approved plan. Thankfully I was recruited into a much bigger, more involved role this year and was able to influence changes based on my field experience. I loved every minute of it.

 

[blindfire]

"An hour later M07 called saying they hadn't seen a bus yet. After a total of 1.5hrs they called saying they had 10 runners waiting (and chilling down) and still hadn't seen a bus. All net control could say was there's nothing they can do and they don't have any information for them. I never did hear how long the first runner waited before the bus finally showed up."

Wow, something certainly wrong there. I wonder if this is accurate.
Net should, at minimum, know when a transport is on station. Is this response from one of the course nets or transport nets?

As a side note, I had one query for information to the net. Didn't get far. I don't think they are set-up/staffed to handle much outside of the script. Or, there are too many points of failure when going off script.

And, if there is an urgent need (10 runners would be urgent in my mind), you would think the transport net should be able to engage in direction/queries (even at the risk of annoying the commercial dispatch).

Seems to me that the NCS for the course should be able to talk to the NCS for the transportation net. Or at a minimum, if you are on the course and you can pickup any of the tango nets, you can always listen in for yourself.

This is the second year I've listened in and wondered why they don't communicate more...but I don't know how the NCSes work together.

 

[vicorjh]

"The buses do run on loops and the med tent is supposed to keep an eye on the bus stop to visualize their arrival. Also the bus is supposed to call arriving 2 minutes before arrival to provide enough time to relay the message between the nets."

Hi GM, some thoughts on this:

Between the way that the tents are set-up along with the approach area for the transports, there are many obstacles. On our route, nearly all approach locations were towards the back of the tent. View towards that back of the tent was covered. And, between the tent and the approach area there would be a large plow truck and other obstructions. With that, it was difficult to actually see the vans without physically leaving the medical tent area. The transport could only approach to within 200meters or so with a blocked view. Plus, several locations were barricaded in such a way that even the runners looking for a transport would have to physically move the barricade or navigate other physical barriers between the transport and the tent. E.g. tent was open towards the course but blocked off to the rear. Where the transports are. Plus, the staff at the tent are busy attending to the runners with lots of activity all around them. I don't know if it's realistic to have the tent staff keeping on eye out for a van that is some obstructed distance from the tent.

As the day want on, we realized this was becoming an issue. As such, it made sense to shadow the van EMTs and touch base with the medical tent at each location.

For announcing ETA, sometimes we didn't know or couldn't predict. Or, if net traffic was high and distance short, didn't have time to make the estimation. Also, what would occur as the day became busy, is that we'd approach the next location on the loop and we'd find a transport already there. As such, we'd skip that location and proceed to the next location. It became difficult to estimate ETAs in this way. In addition, it seems that announcing an ETA for a destination but then immediately leaving for another destination could be a problem. A race condition. There were complaints from the tents about vans announcing they would be/are there but then finding nothing in place. Even if they announced an ETA, arrival, and departure. Also, some transports would announce arrivals and departures for locations that already have a transport in place. As such, the time on station was only cursory as they would continue on to the next location. This seems like it could be confusing for those monitoring for transport.

The only sure thing seems to be announcing arrival, stay on station for a period of time or until a runner was ready to transport, and ensuring a physical check-in at the tent. This seemed to work ok. Though, I had a portable, would simply swap antennas, and then shadow the EMTs to the tent. But, some transports hams only had mobile rigs and could not leave the van without jeopardizing their listening watch.

We really had no idea if a tent had runners waiting or if a tent had problems finding a transport. Until we checked-in with the tent. And, we (transport hams) could not determine if another station in the loop had runners waiting indefinitely without taking the risk of jumping in on the course net. Presumably the coordination was occurring between net-net-commerical dispatch but anecdotal evidence, based on others comments, seems to indicate that is partially working. But, with some other things to also think about / correct / instruct.

 

[ghettomedic]

vicorjh, I fully understand. I worked on the buses the last 2 years and agree completely. I was just stating what is in the plans.
I did not work transport this year and had no hand in planning it, both because of the issues I experienced and because I was recruited to a better opportunity. PLEASE send your feedback to Contact @ Hamradioboston.org so that all of the communications committee can see your concerns, it is even more helpful if you can provide suggested solutions to those concerns.

 

[vicorjh]

gm, thanks. It's difficult to discuss this without sounding like I'm complaining. Not my intent. The exchange happening here is useful for getting my thoughts organized and to swap experiences prior to responding to the coordinators. Overall, things went very well.

 

[ghettomedic]

I understand, just wanted it to be clear that I have very little influence on the Course & Transport sections but I do know that the transport issue has been going on for years and it is mostly because the bus company does not want to cooperate and follow the plans.

 

[blindfire]

vicorjh, I fully understand. I worked on the buses the last 2 years and agree completely. I was just stating what is in the plans.
I did not work transport this year and had no hand in planning it, both because of the issues I experienced and because I was recruited to a better opportunity. PLEASE send your feedback to Contact @ Hamradioboston.org so that all of the communications committee can see your concerns, it is even more helpful if you can provide suggested solutions to those concerns.

Seems to me that the NCSes for the course and transport nets need a better way to coordinate with each other. Is there a NOC (network operation center) that they work out of? If so, there needs to be a messaging apprentice in place such as Google Hangouts or something similar where the course NCS can place a transport request and the transport NCS can give an ACK and ETA for a van or bus.

 

[Love Machine]

So what other events are good to volunteer at with a radio?

 

[ghettomedic]

So what other events are good to volunteer at with a radio?

Follow this thread: http://www.northeastshooters.com/vb...ents/page2?highlight=ham+radio+public+service

I post events I manage or am aware of there

 

[cockpitbob]

So what other events are good to volunteer at with a radio?

Is there a ham club close to you. Many clubs have a public service group. During late sprint to early fall the club in Gloucester seems to do about 2 events per month: parades, runs bike rides, etc.