[Ccarc] RESCUE RADIO: POSTMARK: KATRINA TO AIR ON THE WEATHER CHANNEL

[Phil Snider]

RESCUE RADIO: POSTMARK: KATRINA TO AIR ON THE WEATHER CHANNEL

 

"Postmark:Katrina" produced by Les Rayburn, N1LF, is a Weather Channel 
one hour special that tells the story of efforts by the US Postal 
Service to restore critical mail service to the battered Gulf Coast in 
the wake of hurricane Katrina.

Rayburn and his crew were fully embedded with federal law enforcement 
officers from the US Postal Inspection Service within hours of the 
storm's landfall. They traveled on missions throughout the Gulf Coast 
for weeks following the storm. Rayburn, along with his wife Abby, and a 
soundman alternated between filming the recovery efforts and actually 
assisting in them by providing critical High Frequency communications 
for the National Communications System SHARES program. Working an 
average of 18 hours a day, and often sleeping on post office floors, 
Rayburn was also able to undertake a variety of missions using his Yaesu 
FT-857D and Tarheel screwdriver antenna.

Postmark:Katrina airs Sunday, August 27^th and Monday, August 28^th at 8 
P.M. Eastern and Pacific on The Weather Channel. The documentary 
includes brief portions on amateur radio traffic handeling, has a 
graphic explanation of how repeaters function, and even some Morse Code. 
Rayburn says that it should be of interest to amateur radio operators 
and an opportunity to point out the value of this backup communications 
resource. For more information visit www.weather.com. (TWC, others)

**thanks to amateur radio newsline for this story.
     Phil Snider