Fox Hunt / SET 2016 was a great success

Roughly fourteen amateur radio operators converged on the park near Tanner Medical Center in Carrollton for a combination Simulated Emergency Test and Fox Hunt. John Playford (WD8LQT) developed the scenario under which the event would take place:

An small airplane crashes with only the pilot and a blind passenger. The pilot is injured and is unable to speak, but writes down the frequency he is transmitting on. The blind passenger (our own Lee Studdard, KI4QLV) believes he can make his way down a trail with the note to find help. Lee, being a ham radio operator, took his radio with him and began radioing calls for help on amateur radio frequencies. He finally makes contact but can not tell people where he is or the frequency the injured pilot is transmitting on. To assist rescuers in locating him he transmits for brief periods of time on a regular interval so rescuers (other amateur radio operators) can home in on his radio signal, locate him, and then get the frequency the pilot is transmitting on so the pilot may be rescued.

Lee was stashed away for participants to locate with an HT, simulating the scenario's circumstances. Participants first began homing on Lee's transmissions, complicated by the strength of the signal and reflections off the nearby pond. Once locating Lee, the operator(s) would take one of the pieces of paper that had the frequency of a 2nd hidden transmitter and would begin hunting for it. Since different people were looking for different transmitters at any given moment, things were pretty interesting!

By the time the event wrapped up, around two hours later, all operators had found both Lee and the hidden transmitter.

So much fun was had that it was decided another Fox Hunt should be held in the near future, and planning is under way!