ARRL ARES Volunteers Were Ready to Assist in Wake of Nashville Blast
ARRL Amateur Radio Emergency Service (ARES®) volunteers went on alert, ready to deploy in Williamson County, Tennessee, in the aftermath of an apparently intentional explosion early on Christmas Day in front of an AT&T switching facility in downtown Nashville. The blast injured several people and killed the individual believed responsible for the blast. It also damaged buildings, broke water mains, and disrupted telecommunications.
ARRL Vice Director and Williamson County Emergency Coordinator Ed Hudgens, WB4RHQ, who lives in Nashville, monitored the situation.
“The explosion did a lot more damage than was originally thought,” Hudgens said in the immediate aftermath. “Since about 0730 yesterday, we have had monitoring nets up and running on the local analog repeaters and DMR repeaters. We have mainly been answering questions as best we can.” Hudgens said his ARES group was among those that stood ready to deploy to the Williamson County PSC to assist with communications for various county offices.
The Middle Tennessee Emergency Amateur Repeater System (MTEARS) held nets on its DMR repeater system several times a day. The main repeater at the Tennessee Emergency Management Agency (TEMA) site was affected by the outage. Hudgens said it was fortunate that two DMR repeaters had
gone online recently in Williamson County, and all communications went through them.
WCARES held a continuous net on its five-repeater linked system to assist hams as needed. The net also relayed news updates from AT&T and county governments and assisted callers on AT&T to implement wireless calling on their phones. In addition to the WCARES net, a net activated in Davidson County in Middle Tennessee.
“A big thanks to those monitoring and providing updates!” Don Williams said in a post to the MTEARS Facebook page. “I was able to turn on my HT, locate a good frequency, and get up-to-date information. This was a great help in keeping my house calm with updated info as to the AT&T outage, as both our cell and internet were affected…”
ARRL Headquarters reached out to Tennessee Section Manager David Thomas, KM4NYI, to offer assistance.
