The Special Event held during Emergency Medical Services Week in North America was concluded on the evening of May 24, 2025.
The event was used to bring attention to all First Responders in any emergency, as we used HF SSB to spread the message that we need to thank all our First Responders as publicly as we can, and to let them know how much we appreciate what they do when we most need them. Many times we get their help but circumstances preclude our being able to thank them at the time. With that week being EMS Week, the Special Event using VC3EMS was our way of bringing attention to the great job the First Responders do.
The event started a couple of years ago when W4GJ, Dr. Bob Lightner, in Gainesville Florida contacted me. Bob wanted a partner station to operate during EMS Week when he had the callsign N4E. The station is at the W T Loften High School Amateur Radio Club in Gainesville. I suggested to the then President of LARC, Rick, IMG, that it would be a great opportunity to get involved and use the equipment and antennas that are at the Wing. Rick agreed, and the event was started as part of the Club's Special Events other operation, VE3FIRE, run during Fire Prevention Week in October each year.
During this event we made 644 contacts on HF SSB and were able to say thank you to our First Responders for their work under tough circumstances. They look after us when we most need it. During these events we, as a Club whose members volunteered to operate, got a lot of thanks for putting the event on, and conducting a much appreciated effort to let our First Responders know we appreciate and thank them for their selfless service.
The following Club members offered to help, and from the Club Station at the Wing the following members volunteered to operate:
VE3RBO, Ruth who came out on two different occasions and topped the list with the most contacts made, at 164 contacts!
VE3PTV, Archie
VA3XLS, Luke
VE3NRR, Nathan
VE3FLK, Joshua
VE3NIS, Corbin
VE3IMG, Rick
VE3ACW, Mike who helped with the logging as well as making many contacts.
VA3CBN Greg who operated from his home station
Gianna, SWL who came out for three hours on the first day to see what we were doing. She got a short course from Mike ACW on how to operate and she got on the air and made some contacts. Great!
I did some operations from home between my daily trips to the Wing so Mike and I were there keeping the Club open in case anyone who had not volunteered previously, showed up unannounced.
A big thank you to Corbin, VE3NIS who came to the Club station on Saturday after his Wing breakfast and made some contacts.
I would be remiss if I did not thank Doug, VE3IDT who was so helpful setting up the roster and helping me with the amalgamation of all the various logs into one main ADIF document so it could be posted to the eQSL site. Also thanks to John VA3MSV for his help with bringing Ruth out to operate, and combining the two Club station position logs into one file for VE3IDT.
Thank you Jim, VA3AHQ for posting the report to the LARC website.
The band conditions were not perfect, but we persevered and were able to put a reasonable number of contacts in our final log.
I can only try to encourage more members to support the efforts being made to get the Club station equipment on the air, or to volunteer to help out by getting on the air from your home station if you have one.
A big 'thank you' to those who helped. It was very much appreciated.
Respectfully submitted by:
David VE3KGK
Special Callsign Events Coordinator for LARC
