Hello to all…
**VoIP Hurricane Net Activation for Hurricane Ian Secured at 5 PM EDT/2100 UTC – Friday 9/30/22**
**VoIP Hurricane Net for this Saturday 10/1/22 is canceled due to extended activation for Hurricane Ian this week. Our next net will be Saturday 10/8/22 at 800 PM EDT.**
The VoIP Hurricane Net and WX4NHC, the Amateur Radio station at the National Hurricane Center, secured operations at 500 PM EDT/2100 UTC – Friday 9/30/22 as Ian became a Post Tropical Storm. Ian is now a depression and the NHC has stopped issuing advisories with the Weather Prediction Center issuing advisories on Ian’s remnants. Hurricane Ian brought significant storm surge, fresh water flooding and damaging winds with wind gusts high as 91 MPH at Frying Pan Shoals, North Carolina , 87 MPH at Winyah Bay Range, South Carolina and 82 MPH at Morris Island Lighthouse, South Carolina with numerous locations with wind gusts between 40-80 MPH across Eastern South Carolina and Central and Eastern North Carolina. Ian brought significant storm surge to places such as Pawleys Island and significant fresh water flooding to places such as Charlestown and Georgetown South Carolina. Over 300,000 are without power in North Carolina and at the height of the hurricane, over 150,000 without power in South Carolina.
Over the entire course of Ian from its tropical storm force effects in Grand Cayman, major hurricane landfall in Cuba, his major landfall in Southwest Florida and its landfall in South Carolina into North Carolina, the VoIP Hurricane Net sent around 150 reports, many of which are in the report viewer with a few sent via email to WX4NHC, the Amateur Radio station at the National Hurricane Center. See the report viewer link below to view many of the reports:
https://www.voipwx.net/qilan/nhcwx/list_VOIP_records1?auth=OK
During Ian’s landfall and impacts on Southwest Florida, 7 water rescues were called into the US Coast Guard. We will likely never know the outcome of those rescues but our net was ready and handled those requests that came into our net from various means. Measured wind gusts as high as 140 MPH were recorded in Cape Coral Florida with numerous winds sustained at hurricane force with higher end hurricane force wind gusts. With the loss of power and Internet, it is quite likely even higher wind gusts occurred but will not be known until much after Ian’s passage as the historical forensic weather data is collected. The damage photos and videos received show a very grim picture of the issues in Florida from Hurricane Ian.
Our local National Weather Service office in Boston/Norton Mass was tasked to support monitoring Hurricane Ian for the local NWS offices impacted by monitoring social media and other tasks. Given our strong relationship with the local NWS office, they reached out to us knowing our support of hurricanes. Our net relayed data to the science officer who was tasked with this monitoring and fed this information including our report viewer into the local NWS offices and there was much appreciation for the service this net provided and the data collected. It is possible we could see more of this activity in future hurricanes striking the US East and Gulf coasts.
An approximate volunteer man hour count for this hurricane is estimated to be over 150 hours including the planning, execution and release of activation information and accounting for those stations in the affected area or stations that were relays into the affected area reporting storm damage. Also, for those that are in the affected area and lost power and all Internet connectivity, any post storm damage reports, pictures and videos that you may have may still be useful for recovery efforts and for the historical significance of Ian. They can be sent to my email address directly, via our voipwxnet social media feeds or to the email address pics@nsradio.org
With the extensive activation for Hurricane Ian over multiple days, the VoIP Hurricane Prep Net for this Saturday 10/1/22 is cancelled. Our next VoIP Hurricane Net will be Saturday 10/8/22 unless a hurricane net activation preempts our regular net.
As we look into the Atlantic tropics for this week, there is one tropical wave just west of Africa that has a high chance, 70%, for development in 5 days. It is no immediate threat to land at this time and we will have at least a week to monitor this system before it were to come close to any land areas.
We want to thank all the listen only node owners for providing their capabilities to the net and all those who stood by and monitored the net for Hurricane Ian and Hurricane Fiona a week prior. Thanks to all for their continued support of the VoIP Hurricane Net!
73,Rob-KD1CY.
Director of Operations for the VoIP Hurricane Net
