Greetings!
As many of you are aware, there is a new CT ARES DMR Network being established in Connecticut. This effort is being lead by the Connecticut State Police Amateur Radio Club (W1SP) in collaboration with the CT ARES Leadership Council (CALC) and with support from a number of clubs and individuals as well as a few municipalities.

The growth of DMR in the amateur community has been nothing short of explosive! Even though six months ago most of us couldn't even spell DMR, Connecticut is at the forefront of this rapid expansion! There are currently 27 DMR repeaters operating in the state with 13 of those repeaters on the CT ARES DMR network, with three more under development. This new (to amateur radio) digital mode adds one more tool to our emergency communications capability.

Even though DMR has been in commercial use for years (particularly in Europe), almost all of us hams are new to this technology and learning about it is like taking a drink from a firehose! New terminology — Time Slots, Talk Groups, Color Codes, Admit Criteria, % Packet Loss, RSSI, Subscriber IDs, etc — is only part of the learning curve. The programming options are vastly more complicated than on conventional analog channels and require careful attention to detail to get things right.

We also need to understand how to best utilize this powerful resource. We are actively working on a policy and governance document that will outline guidelines for the use of the CT-ARES DMR Network under both normal day-to-day operations and during an ARES emergency activation.

Starting tomorrow (Sunday, Dec. 14), we will hold a weekly CT ARES DMR SEC Net on the CT ARES DMR Network at 2030 Eastern Time on Sunday evening. These DMR nets will follow the long-standing CT ARES SEC Nets that meet at 2000 Eastern Time on Sundays on the KB1AEV linked repeater system.

So if you have a DMR radio, please join us at 2030 on Sunday evenings! We will utilize the CT ARES SW2 Talk Group (Call ID 8901 on Time Slot 2) that is carried by all of the CT-ARES DMR Network repeaters. I look forward to seeing you on the radio!

Wayne Gronlund, N1CLV
CT Section Emergency Coordinator

"Communications is the link between problems and solutions"