Old-school ham radios can save lives when hurricanes hit cell towers, phone lines (South Carolina)

A teenaged Florida girl listening to her ham radio probably heard Amelia Earhart’s final desperate Mayday call after the legendary pilot crashed onto a tiny island inhabited by gigantic carnivorous crabs in the Pacific Ocean 800 miles from the nearest airport. The 15 year-old wrote down what the woman said; rising tides were flooding her plane. Her navigator was badly hurt. “Send help.”

The Navy was conducting a massive search for Earhart — nine ships, 66 airplanes covering 150,000 square miles. But when the young ham operator’s father alerted the Coast Guard, the message was dismissed as a hoax.

That was in 1937. Today, much more is known about physics, and scientists believe a Florida ham radio could easily have captured Earhart’s plea from the other side of the Earth.

Navy veteran and Charleston Amateur Radio Society president Rick Valentine has forwarded Mayday calls from boats in the Pacific to the Coast Guard — which takes them dead seriously.

When hurricanes approach South Carolina, Valentine heads to Charleston’s Emergency Operation Center to help first responders. If cell towers are destroyed, phone lines and satellites knocked out, “a ham radio operator can still report downed power lines, flooded streets” and neighbors needing wellness checks, he told The Post and Courier.

In rural areas, after storms or floods, hams can relay messages to distant, worried relatives that locals are safe.

Read more – Post and Courier: https://bit.ly/4hoE14m