Polk County Amateur Radio Emergency Service, ARES, provides emergency and public service communications to our served agencies. Getting the message through “when all else fails”.

Our served agencies are Polk County Emergency Management, American Red Cross, Polk County CERT Teams, Polk County Hospitals, and the Municipalities located within Polk County.

Updated 11/06/24 18:50 (local) – We are currently monitoring Hurricane Rafael.  More information can be found by clicking here. 

Polk County CERT sent out an email on 11/05 @ 08:16 that stated the following:  CERT Members, the report from the Polk County Emergency Operations Center is that no direct impact from Tropical Storm Rafael is expected.  There are no plans to activate at this time.

For those who would like to monitor the Hurricane Watch Net, which is currently active, clicking here.

Our September meeting was canceled due to the impacts to our area from the storm.  The meeting presentation titled “National Preparedness Month” is now available at the link below. 

Click here to download/view the September meeting presentation.

For those who attended the October meeting, it was mentioned that one of the videos that there was not time for has a link on this page.  Scroll down to the next section and you will find a link to the video that was on a recent episode of the “On the Air” magazine about the new ARES Task Book.

Check this Web page periodically for info on our next ARES meeting.  Since it would fall on Thanksgiving it is typically re-scheduled and a holiday dinner get together is setup.  So, stay tuned for an update regarding the November/December meetings.

ARRL Issues First Release Update to the ARES Task Book in Several Years

ARRL Emergency Management is pleased to release the first update to the Amateur Radio Emergency Service (ARES) Emergency Communicator Individual Task Book in several years. You can read the story about these new Task Book changes in the ARRL “On The Air” magazine  Sep/Oct 2024 edition.

To view the new ARES Standardized Training Plan – ARES Emergency Communicator Individual Task Book, click here.

To watch the video (released 10/10/24) about the Task Book changes from the “On The Air” podcast, click here.

Hurricane Resources:
National Hurricane Center: https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/
NOAA: https://www.noaa.gov/hurricane-prep
Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) – https://www.fema.gov/
Florida Dept of Emergency Management – https://floridadisaster.org
Ready.gov – https://www.ready.gov/

*** New ARRL EmComm Courses Available ***

ARRL Learning Center Features Two New Emergency Communication Training Courses to train emergency communications operators for volunteering within ARES. A new Basic EmComm as well as an Intermediate EmComm training course are now ready for you to take.  You can read more about these two courses by clicking here.  Links to both of these courses are also available on the Training menu option at the top of this page.

SARNET Update

The Lakeland SARNET repeater on 442.275/+ with a tone of 82.5 is operational, however, the connection to the SARNET system from the Lakeland  (FX1 site)  is poor.  Since some time in April, the repeater is receiving signals from SARNET, albeit weak and noisy.  Transmissions from the SARNET Lakeland repeater were being heard on SARNET, but reception of SARNET is noisy.  This could just be conditions but we have had times when our transmissions were not being heard on SARNET.

Thanks to Polk County Emergency Management, an alternative radio and antenna to access the SARNET system from the Polk County EOC has been provided.   While SARNET in Lakeland is down, our current plan until the link is repaired is to use the Tampa SARNET repeater on 442.850/+ with a tone of 146.2. 

One of our served agencies, CERT, as well as other emergency communicators, have a GMRS net on the Polk CERT repeater.  (note: This is NOT an ARES net, but welcome to all FCC licensed GMRS operators interested in emergency communications)

Have you ever wanted to know if a ham you know also has a GMRS license?  Well, you can find out by clicking this link.

The Polk ARES ICS-205 and Polk County ARES Band Plan have been updated.  You can find them under the Operations menu option at the top of this page.

Our focus is on preparation and training for wireless communications during disasters and public service events.  A  Statewide Florida Emergency website has been opened.  Come check it out.  

Winlink RMS Gateways in Polk County
144.930 WC4PEM-5
144.950 W4PSR-5

The Imperial Polk County ARES Net is held every Wednesday at 7:00pm EST on the following frequencies on the Polk County Emergency Management, WC4PEM, repeater system:

This is a wide area linked repeater system. Pick the repeater located closest to you. You should be able to reach one of our repeaters with a 5 watt HT from anywhere in Polk County. If you are not, please contact Polk ARES through our contact page and we will help you find an antenna solution.

The repeater is Echolink accessible (Echolink node 3363).

Click here for a coverage map of the WC4PEM FM linked repeater system.

The WC4PEM D-Star Gateway repeater located in Bartow is on 444.4875.  You can view the dashboard for this repeater by clicking here. (note: this repeater is a D-Star Gateway and is connected to the Internet.  It is NOT linked to the FM repeater system)