The BergenSkywarn Website
Scheduled Drills For SKYWARN Operations
In Bergen And Passaic Counties NJ
- Please Note: During all Active Bergen-Passaic County SKYWARN Nets, any and all reports of NWS defined Severe Weather will be taken and forwarded to the appropriate NWS Forecast Office. You do not need to be located in Bergen or Passaic Counties to report developing or occurring NWS defined Severe Weather on a Bergen-Passaic SKYWARN Net. We do request that only the specific information requested by the Net Control Station be reported on the Net so as to insure that all reports of developing or occurring Severe Weather can be quickly handled and processed. Your understanding is greatly appreciated.
Revised March 15, 2003
Drills for Bergen and Passaic County SKYWARN Operations will be held every Monday at 10:00 PM local time (2200 hours) on the W2PQG 2 Meter Repeater of the 10-70 Repeater Association. The frequency will be 146.700 Mhz, with a -600 Khz offset and a PL of 141.3. More information on Alternate and Backup Frequencies for Bergen and Passaic Counties is available on the Bergen and Passaic Counties SKYWARN Net Frequencies Webpage.
Please note that Emergency Traffic always has precedence on any Amateur Radio frequency or repeater and that these Drills will be cancelled if such a need arises before or during a Drill.
The purpose of these exercises will be to familiarize all interested parties with the procedures that will be used during an Active SKYWARN Net in Bergen and/or Passaic Counties, NJ. They will be used to fine tune the procedures for taking Spotter reports and observations in preparation for forwarding them to the NWS during an Active SKYWARN Net. They will also be utilized to train additional Net Control Operators and verify the Simplex coverage areas of our Net Control Operators should a Simplex SKYWARN Net be needed in either Bergen or Passaic County NJ.
They will be Directed Nets with all communication going through Net Control. Following a request for any Emergency Traffic by the Net Control Operator, the Check-in procedure for the Drills (as well as for active SKYWARN Nets) will be to give the Callsign of the Net Control Station, then drop your carrier to insure you are not doubling with another station, then give your own Callsign, your location (City, County and State) and if you are Portable or Mobile please indicate..
After Check-ins are taken, a Net Roster Call-up will be made by the Net Control Operator. Stations will be normally called upon for Reports in the order that they checked into the Net, however in Short Fuse type events (Tornado or Severe Thunderstorm Warnings) priority traffic will be taken first. When called, all stations are to report their specific information as requested by Net Control for the particular event (this could include things such as SKYWARN Spotter ID, sky condition, temperature, barometric pressure, etc.). Please only report the items being asked for by the Net Control Station. As noted above, any Emergency Traffic will always take precedence.
When called by Net Control, if you have no data to report, please respond with "No Report". Due to the sometimes immediate nature of severe weather events and their associated data collection, it is important to be precise and concise with your reports.
For additional information on Bergen and/or Passaic County SKYWARN Drills, Active SKYWARN Nets or anything regarding the Bergen and/or Passaic Counties SKYWARN Program, please contact any of the Bergen or Passaic County SKYWARN Coordinators.