Over the past decade a lot of technological innovations has changed the way we chase storms. While I still consider ham radio communications to be an extremely important part of my chase rig for emergency communications, I no longer depend on my ICOM dual-band radio as much as I did just five storm seasons ago.

Ham radio itself is struggling. The American Radio Relay League is constantly coming up with new marketing campaigns aimed at the general public to increase awareness of ham radio. Dealers have had to make a choice of either staying as a traditional “brick and mortar” shop, or compete online in a global marketplace.

Last month, Tornado Alley lost a well known ham radio dealer – Burghardt Amateur Center in Watertown, SD declared that it will no longer sell new ham radio equipment and will become “Burghardt Radio Repair Inc.” and will only service radio equipment from now on. I am sure this was a well thought out decision on their behalf, but I fail to see the successful business model in the idea myself. Radio equipment, like all other techie gizmos has reached a price where its often cheaper to replace a dead radio with a new radio under warranty than to repair the dead unit. That is of course as long as we’re talking about the typical handheld or land-mobile radio platform and not base stations in excess of $10K.

I suspect that over the next decade ham radio usage will continue to decline sadly enough. Perhaps today’s K-6 kids who will one day dominate Tornado Alley won’t even know what a radio transceiver is. Still, I continue to believe that ham radio is a critical piece of equipment to have in your chase setup – simply because the whole purpose of ham radio (while chasing) is to provide emergency communications when all else fails.

Many things could happen to create a disruption of cellular communications in Tornado Alley, and especially when working in the proximity of supercells or squall lines. Even if the nearest cellular tower to you remains operational, the power grid and phone system of the receiving end of your phone call may not be. Ham radio still fills the gap during these emergency situations, and at least for the foreseeable future that isn’t going to change.

We’re already seeing post popping up on storm chasing bulletin boards with titles such as “How many chasers use ham radio?” It’s just sad that such questions have to be asked.

73,
KD5SMH

Tags: storm chasing, technology