Lee Co AREE Assists in Winter Storm Fern
Lee County ARES (Amateur Radio Emergency Service) had to cancel the scheduled demonstration of their Emergency Communications trailer at Giddings Plaza on Saturday, January 24th due to a real life emergency. What was scheduled to be a day of training and public outreach, was transformed into a real-life activation due to the arrival of Winter Storm Fern.
Because of the severe ice storm warnings, Lee County ARES in conjunction with other sister ARES groups in Central Texas and beyond, initiated a SKYWARN net. This net provided updated weather warning announcements every 30 minutes and requested real-time observations from other amateur radio operators in the area. These reports included ice accumulation, infrastructure outages, and road conditions, which were directly relayed to the National Weather Service (NWS).
Lee County ARES were also able to support Bastrop County thanks to the Bastrop Repeater System linked via RF to the Giddings repeater. This system has been linked to our Monday weekly nets for a few months now, and this storm initiated real-life assistance between the two bordering counties. Bastrop County ARES has been inactive for several years, however a new Bastrop Co ARES Emergency Coordinator has been recently appointed.
Three Lee Co ARES operators manned the SKYWARN net for 29 hours, relaying twenty messages to the NWS about ice and road reports. Other members were providing information, including a mobile unit traveling locally for his daily job. Because of the sleet, instead of the heavier snow and frozen rain, only a few neighborhoods in Bastrop Co experienced power outages.
A few Lee Co ARES members are also part of the Radio Amateur Civil Emergency Service (RACES). RACES is a governmental program whose main purpose is the continuation of government during emergency situations. It is endorsed by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and administered by the Texas Division of Emergency Management.
As RACES, we were activated at Level III on January 23 with the likelihood to being elevated to Level II. Trigger elements would have been widespread power outages (roughly 25% or more of a county), critical infrastructure loss to an isolated community (water, power, access), ongoing or imminent evacuations for critical facilities (nursing home, hospital, etc.), rescues involving state resources, significant impacts to one or more counties/communities requiring state assistance, or a request from a local jurisdiction to activate Emergency Operations Centers (EOC) to a higher level. Thankfully, none of the above happened, and we were able to stand down Sunday at noon.
Lee County ARES will reschedule the public demonstration event at the Giddings Plaza in the near future. We will be looking forward to meeting Giddings and Lee county neighbors then.