APRS Provides Enhanced Experience at Fireworks Endurance Ride in Santa Cruz
By Allison Hershey, KM6RMN (PIO)
The Santa Cruz County Horsemen’s Association’s annual Fireworks Endurance Ride covers 30 to 50 miles of natural terrain in the Santa Cruz Mountains. The remote nature of the ride made traditional communication a challenge. So, since 2009 they have received some assistance from members of Santa Cruz County Amateur Radio Emergency Service (ARES) in an unofficial capacity. This year ARES members decided to increase their involvement and also use Automatic Packet Reporting System (APRS) as one of its communication tools. Their aim was to give participants a better experience, let their families mark their ride progress, and facilitate safety and logistical information flow for the ride organizers.
Historically, the philosophy of the endurance ride event was to duplicate conditions of the old west: minimal involvement with modern technology and an authentic experience of problem solving and endurance. Recent years have seen a gradual change in this view, with more interest in applying communication tools for the safety of the riders, and a realization of how radio can assist with the logistics of running the race.
Hap Bullard (KQ6YV), a long-time communications organizer for the race, was the ARES liaison with the Horsemen’s Association. He recruited around 35 radio operators and filed the paperwork for the expanded phone operations. Their operations were administered well, but the focus of our story is on the digital team. Donald Kerns (AE6RF), Sebastian Steinhauer (KK6FBF), Roberta Roberts (AJ6KN), and Ray Rischpater (KF6GPE) formed the core of the team.
Donald Kerns had been involved with the Fireworks ride on and off since 2009. He had also experienced the Tevis 100-mile endurance ride near lake Tahoe, which had been using a larger pool of radio operators and APRS regularly in recent years. He made the case to Fireworks organizers for expanding the APRS Winlink component, so they could achieve a finer grain of status reporting as experienced by the other event. Information could be sent digitally with more efficiency than voice and could be posted to a website so that everyone could see it immediately. He received mixed acceptance, but it was enough to start planning.
While Hap was pulling together the overall operation, the digital team started planning their part. Their goal was to establish a pipeline of digital information between people in the field to net control, using Winlink, with AX.25 protocol from several locations. The information would be collected at a central location and posted online, with access granted using QR codes.
Planning was done through emails, phone calls and a single Zoom meeting due to continued uncertainty with the Covid-19 situation. Sebastian set up the information hub in his home and created the information database. Ray, Roberta, and Donald tried out the three 2m Winlink digipeaters located in Santa Cruz and tested their equipment at several locations near the ride route.
Some radio operators arrived at the start-finish area the night before the August 28th all-day event, but most of the team started their preparations around 6:30 the morning of the ride. Two routes, 30 miles and 50 miles, wound a loop through the mountains of Santa Cruz from Graham Hill Showgrounds near Scotts Valley to Wilder Ranch State Park in West Santa Cruz. They were to be covered by radio operators at strategic locations, using 70cm simplex as their primary channel, plus repeaters on 70cm, 2m, and some testing at 6m. Most operators focused on rider locations, reporting safety issues and injuries, directing rescue trailers, and locating lost riders. About half a dozen operators focused primarily on reporting logistics with packet radio, using WB6RJH-10, K6BJ-10 repeaters, plus K6BJ-11 repeater for a brief AX.25 9600 baud test.
There were four main data collection stations: Start/Finish, (Ray Rischpater KF6GPE), Graham Hill Showgrounds ARES table (Bob Fike KO6XX), vet-check at Gray Whale (Donald Kerns K6WC), and Twin Gates near Wilder Park (Roberta Joiner Roberts AJ6KN). They reported to the information center (Sebastian Steinhauer KK6FBF) at his home in Boulder Creek. He entered data in the online database, which was almost immediately available to those with QR code access online.
Sebastian had a fully equipped radio setup, but it took a couple of weeks before the event to optimize his operations. He created the database on his Linux system to parse the Winlink data and report it in different formats using MySQL output in PHP. He used his own server for the RMS station and created a website for people to look up information. The plan was for the Winlink operators around the course to collect information from observers and send it on via packet transmission similar to email over radio approximately every 20 minutes. Sebastian entered the information into the online database which updated in real time.
Sebastian’s operation went very well through three quarters of the race. Then there was a power failure affecting his whole neighborhood. This could have brought the Winlink experiment to a halt, but Sebastian was prepared. He converted to generator power and packed up his mobile gear and laptop in case he had to relocate. He could operate out of his car in a parking lot if needed. He was offline for only 10 minutes, but the data flow continued while he packed his car, saved as email. Fortunately, none of the data was lost, but he spent a stressful period catching up. The power outage continued past the end of the event. The
impact on operators in the field was minimal. Ray said he didn’t even notice. Sebastian occasionally checked back with operators to line up the information he was sent. There was never a discrepancy. He was able to wrap up operations at the same time as the race ended. The report of the last horse at the finish line was the end of data.
The Twin Gates location was a combined net control, APRS, and spotters’ station. Roberta was seated next to net control and sometimes subbed for him during breaks. It was the highest location on the whole course, so had best access to all station frequencies in use. Spotters collected information as the horses passed, such as times, bib numbers, and notes, and conveyed it to her, who then transmitted it to Sebastian. At times it was busy.
The Twin Gates location was out of reach of internet or cell service other than texting, so Roberta had no access to the online database. She had a Kantronics Packet Communicator 3 Plus TNC, Yaesu FT 220 2m radio, and an Ed Fong Roll up J-pole on a 32-foot mast. Working with 1200 baud AX.25, she was able to keep up with the information but the radio connection to the internet was slow and made it hard for her to receive aggregated data back from Sebastian. It was good practice for a communications emergency but meant that she was working with little feedback.
At vet-check, horse arrivals and physical conditions were noted and reported by Donald. Horse welfare was a high priority, and if a horse showed signs of overheating or overexertion, it was pulled. Because the weather was in the high 90s, a number of horses had to drop out. Having the Winlink database information on horse status was a real boon in this instance.
Donald’s Winlink configuration was a standard 1200 baud AX.25 using a Windows laptop, TinyTrak4 KISS TNC, Kenwood TM-281A 2m radio and Ed Fong J-pole, powered by a battery/solar array. One of Donald’s interests was optimizing his equipment for quick set-up during deployment, and he was able to get his Winlink operation going in 10 minutes.
As lead operator at vet-check, the Winlink operation was not Donald’s only concern. He tried several other experiments while he was working. He conducted 6m and solar power tests and made a brief attempt to operate Winlink at 9600 baud. The higher speed was not successful, but he will try it again next year with an antenna upgrade.
At the Start/Finish station, Ray reported finish line times. He switched from radio to Telnet to avoid early-on interference he had experienced using voice simplex. His 5W antenna setup worked well when he tested it, but voice communications nearby were affected. Though cell reception was not the best, the telnet connection is very low bandwidth, and works even when cell phone coverage is poor. He had a 400 W system to keep his laptop charged. Telnet transmission was fast and clear, in contrast with Roberta’s experience transmitting by radio.
Bob had set up the ARES information center on the Graham Hill Showgrounds next to his movable ham shack, a recreational vehicle nicknamed Sophie. He set up his Winlink APRS station with an eye towards providing database information to the ride organizers and participants on demand. He ran a 1200 baud AX.25 setup with a Signalink interface, a 50W Yaesu radio and Diamond X-50 antenna. He displayed information on an outward facing monitor as well as his laptop to inform the public of ride progress. He answered curious passerby questions, helped locate particular horses on the course, and recruited a few inactive hams back into the fold and possibly into ARES.
There were other stations scattered around the course to monitor race conditions. They usually operated VHF phone transmission, tested 6m operation, and transmitted some data via Winlink. Dan Selling (N6RJX) reported that the remote locations made internet and cell service almost nonexistent, so they could not check the database for feedback. But they were able to get useful information out.
Ride results were impressive. There were around 110 entries. Thirty-two had to drop out because of the extreme heat, almost 30%. This high percentage had also happened at the Tevis race, and part of the problem may have been less than normal pre-ride conditioning due to Covid restrictions over the last year. There were also a couple of bolted horses, and several riders got lost and had to be tracked down. Radio communications were crucial in these situations. The Winlink experiment netted 168 Winlink messages with 863 horse times. There were 230 different Winlink messages. 10 to 50 data points were communicated per message.
In the subsequent evaluation, all radio operators looked for shortcomings, and they did find some room for improvement. Initial planning was scattered, which made the operation a little disjointed. It was suggested that all operators, voice and digital, be given the digital plan, and more training in setting up APRS. Some were not comfortable with the one-way digital communication in remote spots. There were also conflicting requests for fewer data points for simpler reporting and retrieval, and more data points for a better picture, especially to explain reasons for a horse being pulled. There was considerable redundancy in status reports. There was a consensus that communications between ride organizers and radio operators could be improved. Options were discussed regarding rider changes and update notifications, making printouts available to volunteers, and keeping track of first and last horses for logistics. And considering the power
failure and one-way Winlink communications, Sebastian said he would set up his operation closer to net control. Roberta suggested net control be in a quieter location away from noise, dust, and visitors.
But overall, the experiment was a remarkable success. Ray said that Winlink equipment operation worked much better than expected. Sebastian said they were able to digitize a lot of information and display it on the website, available for organizers back at showgrounds. This gave them a good picture of rider progress. As with most ride events, there were lost riders and pulled horses, but they were able to account for every entry by the end of the race. Roberta said this information saved the ride organizers hours of accounting for every horse and making sure all were safe at the end. Sebastian said he will document what was learned and apply it to later events. He was already coming up with ways APRS would be useful in a disaster for tracking supplies and logistics.
APRS was an excellent tool for an event of this size and scope. Santa Cruz ARES AEC Karen Corscadden (KM6SV) summed up the exercise this way:
“The effort was a sterling example of the ability of ARES operators to improvise and make things work under a variety of situations. That’s one of our prime strengths and part of the value we bring to our served agencies. I hope that moving forward we not only work to refine this “packet radio situation tracking” capability that we have added but that we continue to challenge ourselves to add and develop new capabilities.”
