Community Events report: NPARC’s participation in local Community Events continues.

Once again, our club was involved in providing emergency communications for the Niagara Falls Santa Claus parade on Saturday, November 19th. We were lucky once again with the weather, which was cool but very bright. There were seven club members who participated, they were:

• Geddie, VE3CJX
• Jim, VE3BCA
• Peter, VA3WET
• Dave, VE3RXN
• Tony, VE3XNT
• Ian, VE3ERL
• Denis, VE3KVE

We all wore the new club vests which gives us a very professional appearance. Jim and Geddie set up the net control station by the gazebo on Valley Way (right next to the “free hot chocolate and Timbits” stand. Perhaps they both set a record for how many Timbits an Amateur can eat in three hours!).

Jim, VE3BCA has a lot of experience in running a net control station, and he used this knowledge to good effect. He got us to use the club call sign VE3VM for the net control station. Geddie, VE3CJX working with Jim, did most of the radio work to keep us all informed and on track. As a group we were stationed at various strategic spots along the parade route as follows:

• Net control station, located at the gazebo on Valley Way, Jim, VE3BCA and Geddie, VE3CJX.
• At the start point of the parade (and following along with the last floats) Ian, VE3ERL.
• At the corner of Victoria Ave. and Morrison, Dave, VE3RXN.
• At the corner of Victoria Ave. and Valley Way, Tony, VE3XNT.
• At the corner of Queen Street and St. Clair, Peter, VA3WET.
• Roaming where needed, Denis, VE3KVE.

We met at the gazebo at 9:00 am and set up a table, chairs, and the club banner. Geddie had brought these along. We also had a set of flyers about the club that Peter, VA3WET had designed and Kevin, VA3KGS had provided. The pre-parade (Project Share and others, soliciting food gifts) started at 10:45 am and the main parade started at 11:00 am. There were 100 floats and bands (eight marching bands), so there was a lot of noise. Most of the groups included high school kids and they were great, obviously enjoying themselves immensely and doing a fine job – an acknowledgement of many hours of tutoring by teachers and lots of practice. We officially closed our involvement with the parade and wrapped up the net control station at around 12;30 pm as the last float in the parade (Santa Claus – who else?) arrived at City Hall.

The safety precautions enforced were very effective and there were no problems. Our role as Amateurs was therefore comparatively easy, but the City of Niagara is happy to have us deployed as we do, for immediate communication if necessary. We were allocated one of the rented commercial Motorola handi-talkie radios so that we could have immediate contact with the St. John’s Ambulance, Police, the chief marshall, or the City of Niagara Falls parade coordinator.

As the club representative with the City of Niagara Community Events committee (with help also by Geddie, who also participated in some of the committee meetings), I would like to offer my sincere thanks to each of the Amateurs who participated. Each operated in a very professional manner and as a group I believe that we represented the Niagara Peninsula Amateur Radio Club and Amateur Radio in general, in a very positive manner.

This was a well-planned and successful parade by the City of Niagara Falls, and a very creditable participation by our club members. Thanks everyone!

Denis, VE3KVE