Quote from KV4ATV on April 12, 2019, 12:43 pm

Surviving the Cat 5/6 Hurricane Michael plus the F1-F3 tornadoes that spun in the eye wall like a buzz saw destroying everything in it's path really woke the panhandle of Florida up. It lasted nearly 5 1/2 hrs with no eye wall calm over our area. We emerged from where we were seeking safety to find we nearly didn't know where we were. Our world as we knew it was forever gone. Trees, telephone poles down, houses, buildings, etc... damaged and or totally destroyed. There was no power, no water, no telephone "cell phone included", no internet, no nothing. As people looked around in total shock, the reality that we'd been thrown back hundreds of years "so to say" and the quiet was like nothing we'd heard before. Roads were completely blocked and or destroyed. Have fun getting around even on foot if you could unless you knew the area like the back of you hand. All the land marks people knew were either gone or under so many downed trees you couldn't see them or make them out. Street signs were also gone. Dark was coming soon and my wife and I had to get things together at flank speed. Our 5 kids really needed us at that time. First was to make sure we all had a safe and secure place to bed down for the night. That my wife and four of our kids did. My oldest son teamed up with me. Without power or a generator, we'd be left in the dark. That was not an option. Time to really think and work like a Ham Radio Operator. We cleared enough of a path that we could park the 1 ton diesel van in front of the house. Calculating the fuel we had, a full tank, that should give us between 5 to 5 1/2 days at an idle. This was a must to keep the 2 batteries up which power the 4KW Tripplite inverter on board. We ran power cables into the house, found a couple of power strips and got 2 drop lights, 2 fans and the frig back online. We had three 5 gal fresh water bottles full so we had drinking water plus what was in the frig. Next we found a few 5 gal buckets and got water from anywhere we could to keep in the bath rooms for flushing. I'd talked to one other Ham in our area not far from me on the KF4JMM repeater just as the hurricane was making land fall. Me being in my van wasn't the safest place and my family needed me with them. I signed off telling him I call him as soon as the storm passed. We were told that this hurricane was expected to be at worse a strong Cat 3. NWS really got this one wrong. The back window on the drivers side had take a piece of a tree impact and had shattered. There was debris, water, and glass all through the van. My 2 meter rig was wet and bearly working. I tried several times to raise someone and noticed the repeater was off the air. Yes it was off the air, no power and God only knows if the antennas were still there. I didn't know until later that the repeater was located on top of the Bay Medical Center and it took a direct hit of an F2 tornado. After some hopping around I finally was able to find just 2 other operators who were back on the air. Looking on the FM radio I found just 1 station. It was I-Heart Radio. All 911, police, fire, rescue communications were dead silent and gone. None of us had even a hint of a cell signal on our phones. That 2 meter rig was our only communication life line out of here. After checking on all the people in our area to see if anyone was injured or killed, I got a count of the people so I could relay it to where ever as soon as I could and let someone know how bad it was here and what was needed. Except for climbing through everything we were buried and trapped in. Time to cut a way out. I check all lines before touching them to make sure there was no power on them, safety first, I started cutting wires and cables then pushed them out of the road the best I could. My son worked on getting trees and debris cleared enough that we had at least one lane to use that led to the main road. I was really pushing myself at my age and health. Having high blood pressure, COPD, and asbostosis didn't help either. Had to really use the brain because the brawn was gone. This dark, cave man time seemed to be endless. Hours turned to days which turned to weeks before we saw any help coming in. For those who didn't know just how bad this was, there are may videos on YouTube of Panama City being destroyed by this storm. I've been babbling on probably too long about this for the moment. I plan to do a detailed write up and post it as time allows. To the topic of this post. EOC now sees and has asked our Ham radio people for help. Sad it took this kind of doom and destruction to get this to happen. I am a member of the ARRL, AMSAT, ARES, and going back into MARS like I was in Europe. In the ARES meeting and other meeting I attend, I've brought up the point that our ATV is the best option so they can send what is needed where. A picture paints a thousand words and ATV paints volumes. Many in EOC, the police, fire and rescue never knew we operate ATV stations. At the current time, as far as a transmitter goes, I'm the only one on the air but many can see and hear me. They are now interested in building or buying ATV for their stations. I want and am going to start an ATV group here in Panama City Fl and make our service available to any city, county or state within driving range. My station is running QRP at the moment. I really need a small 12 volt Amp for 70cm ATV. Still cleaning and repairing has tapped me out for the time being and there is another hurricane season coming soon. It is predicted to be as active as last year. Not Good at all. My ATV transmitter is a 5 watt max NTSC format I got from MFJ. I made a copper pipe J-Pole from plans found online and tuned it to 434 MHz with the MFJ 269C. WalMart had a sale on some small TV's and I got one that runs on 12 VDC so it makes it perfect for mobile operations. If anyone has or knows where I can locate an Amp to go with this please get in touch with me at KV4ATV@gmail.com  I'd like to get some T-shirts and a banner with the ATN on it for our area group that is starting now. Any ideas? Also, how would I get us in the roster of ATN groups on this site? Work to do so I'll post more soon. Thank you for taking time to read this.

Wolfgang KV4ATV  Panama City, Fl

850 867-8796 mobile number.