Rise and Shine Bulletin (Feb. 19, 2025)

The Rotary Club of
Reno Sunrise

Chartered 1985

Rise & Shine Bulletin

Davis Fire Presentation by President Dan

Posted by Jon Greene on Feb. 14, 2025

Our speaker this morning was our own President Dan, also known as General Dan. During the Davis Fire Dan was the Nevada National Guard Joint Task Force Commander. Dan talked to us about the Davis fire, and the NV National Guard's participation in the fire.

The Guard had 101 personnel working security which included staffing 11 traffic control points and roving security to prevent looting. They also contributed to the fire suppression effort with one hand crew deployed to Joy Lake, 3 water dropping helicopters, and an aircraft maintenance team.

The traffic control and security personnel worked under the direction of the Washoe County Sheriff's Office providing law enforcement support.

Dan also talked about the procedures that the various aircraft units followed and the safety protocol which included the FAA establishing a temporary flight control area staffed by FAA controllers. And he talked a little about the evacuations.

SOTA - Summits on the Air Presentation by Craig Sande

Posted by Craig Sande on Feb. 07, 2025

Summits on The Air (SOTA) is an award scheme for radio amateurs that encourages portable operation in mountainous areas. Specific summits are given a point rating based upon the altitude and difficulty. Some summits also provide wintertime or summertime bonus points based upon their location.

Radio amateurs who climb to the summits are called "activators" and those who try to make contact from home are called "chasers." A "summit-to-summit" contact is always special. After accumulating 1,000 points as activator or chaser, the operator receives either a "Mountain Goat" or "Shack Sloth" award.

Although the program has existed since 2002, I have only been a participant since January 2024. There are about 24,000 participants worldwide.

My statistics at this point in time:

179 summit activations
1275 points (activating)
5407 points (chasing)

During the presentation I demonstrated the lightweight radio and antenna setup and described the details of planning and execution of several summit activations.

To learn more information, please see: https://www.sota.org.uk/