April of 1998 a meeting was arranged at the Department of Transportation (DOT) by David Sargent (who is also the department Chief of Marine Safety and environment Protection for the Auxiliary).  Represented was the Federal Highway Administration(FHWA), office of Emergency Transportation(OET), Coast Guard liaison officer for communications for the office of the Secretary of Transportation(OST), and our own Department Chief of Operations Bill Herman.

The reason for the meeting was to incorporate the Coast Guard Auxiliary Radio facilities into the FHWA high frequency(HF) radio network to help provide additional support to the DOT’s crisis management center.  A Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) was ultimately drafted and at NACON ‘99 was formally signed by all Departments involved.  On 19 April 2000 release of information that allows authorized stations to operate in the FHWA radio nets.

The OET has control of a number of HF frequencies between 2-30 MHz.  The frequencies are not within the amateur bands, so their use requires HF radios capable of operating on non amateur frequencies between 2-30 MHz.  The OET also has numerous HF frequencies for every district and area.  The National telecommunications division has been attempting to obtain HF frequencies for the Districts to use for nation wide radio net drills, in preparation for any disaster that may occur.  This has not always been successful.  With the frequencies from the FHWA available this problem will be eliminated.  The owners of our high frequency radio facilities will be given the opportunity to gain operational experience while at the same time supporting the DOT disaster efforts, and by extension certainly enhance our ability for direct support to the Coast Guard.

Instructions had been placed on the website and can now be found in the operations division of the Coast Guard Auxiliary as well as sent to all of the DSOs/CM.  As this article is written we have over forty Auxiliarists who have applied for the program.  Mr. Tehran Anderson who is in charge of the FHWA program has processed the radios which included, an authorization letter, 4 frequencies, call sign, assignment to a district, the name of the civilian personnel who is in charge of the district, and an identification card indicating we are working with the FHWA.  The person in charge of the district determines how frequently drills are conducted and on what frequency.  If a district has sufficient radios that belong to the program by contacting the DVC-OT for clearance of a frequency, they may conduct their own drills for practice purposes.  The information has been mailed to all applicants who applied to the program.  Hopefully in the next couple of weeks practice drills will be arranged between districts as established by the FHWA.  With what we have received the Telecommunications division becomes a more self sufficient department.  Hopefully, more lives will be saved with the increase of communication capabilities.  The MOU between the FHWA and the Coast Guard Auxiliary has consummated an ideal marriage.  The FHWA needed more radios and the Auxiliary needed Frequencies.  Anybody may apply for the program who can meet the necessary requirements.  The FHWA will welcome all those individuals who are interested, please remember the better trained we are the more capable we will be to support the Coast Guard when we are needed in summary, the CGAUX/FHWA represents an important advance in Auxiliary communications.  The expanded number of qualified HF stations and the enhanced technical expertise represented by the owners/operators, a new chapter in auxiliary communications is being opened.

Communications may be addressed to:

April 2000