Join Our Club

 

NIHRAC, 50 years serving our community.
 Welcome to NIHRAC  

The National Institutes of Health Radio Amateur Club (est. 1963)

                             Bethesda, Maryland, USA

MEMBERSHIP

We welcome applications from anyone interested in amateur radio and emergency communications.  We have members who are current and past NIH personnel, representatives from the local community, and others who have traveled to various DX zones.  We do ask that children are accompanied by responsible adults, but other than that an interest in or curiosity about the many aspects of amateur radio will find a home here. To file a membership application, visit our Contact Us page.

NIHRAC members enjoy use of our Club’s facilities and resources, can participate in our meetings, projects and activities, and serve as the backbone of the NIH emergency communication system during scheduled outages and in case of an emergency event. Members' participation in mergency communications activities is not mandatory. After our regular meetings, we often have technical presentations and demonstrations about a variety of topics related to the hobby, and/or collaborate in technical projects of common interest. Club members can also volunteer during emergency communications drills at the NIH campus or vecinity a few times per year.

New members who have not yet received their amateur license from the FCC can be assisted by the club to go through the licensing process. The FCC licensing process is relatively painless. All levels of licensing require the completion of a multiple choice test, graded at the time of completion. The entry-level exam can be easily passed with a modicum of study, and the question pool can be found on the American Radio Relay League (ARRL) Website or the National Conference of Volunteer Examiner Coordinators (NCVEC) Website.  Although we don't administer exams, there are several relatively-close organizations that do.
 
CLUB RESOURCES
 
NIHRAC operates the Emergency Communications Center (ECC) at the Bethesda, Maryland campus of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The Club is responsible for supporting and maintaining communications within NIH and with other federal facilities in the event of an emergency.
 
The ECC facilities include:
  • Meeting/operations rooms
  • Electronics workbench & test equipment
  • Two High Frequency (HF) radio stations
  • Very High Frequency (VHF) and Ultra High Frequency (UHF) stations
  • Voice over IP to radio gateway (EchoLink)
  • Computer terminals to support digital communications via radio
  • A wide variety of antennas to support almost any operation
  • Equipment available for check out by club members
  • VHF and UHF repeaters
  REPEATERS
 
 We maintain two amateur radio repeaters on the NIH Clinical Center (building 10).  Both are open repeaters, but may be sequestered during drills, safety, and emergency operations.  EchoLink (K3YGG-R) connectivity is provided on the 2M repeater to facilitate participation from members who live outside of the immediate area.  
2 meter FM Repeater: 
    144.69 MHz input / 145.29 MHz output
    PL5A (156.7 Hz) encoding is sometimes required for access. This feature is activated at the discretion of the control operator to reduce seasonal radio interference problems.
 
70 cm FM Repeater: 
    442.925 MHz input / 447.925 MHz output
 CLUB MEETINGS
 
 
The Club normally meets the first Saturday of every month at the Club facilities in NIH. See About Us for directions. We also have a weekly net (on-air meeting) every Monday at 9:00 p.m. on our 2 meter repeater.  We welcome check-ins from all stations over the air or via EchoLink (K3YGG-R).
OUR CALLSIGNS
 
Amateur Radio:
K3YGG
W3NIH
KB3SKV
 
MARS Radio:
 AAN3NIH
AAN3NI
AAN3NA
 
NCS SHARES:
KID470
 
 
SOLAR ACTIVITY
 
 Solar X-rays:
Status

Geomagnetic Field:
Status

(Full report at n3kl.org)
 
GADGETS
 

Callook.info Callsign Lookup

The DXZone


News and Announcements

  • NIHRAC's 50th Anniversary This March, the NIH Radio Amateur Club commemorated its 50th birthday. During ths time, the Club has been proudly serving emergency communications needs of the National Institutes of Health, and ...
    Posted Apr 2, 2013, 10:24 AM by Victor Cid
  • NIHRAC Field Exercise on NIH Campus NIHRAC will conduct a field-communications exercise on the NIH campus in the morning of September 21st, 2012. Station setup work will start at 8:30am on the west ...
    Posted Sep 14, 2012, 12:13 PM by Victor Cid
  • NIHRAC at Capital Shield 2011 The three BHEPP hospitals--Suburban-John Hopkins Hospital, the NIH Clinical Center and the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center--particiated in an emergency drill on October 19th. NIHRAC members ...
    Posted Nov 1, 2011, 2:16 PM by Victor Cid
  • Capital Shield Excercise The Bethesda Hospitals' Emergency Preparedness Partnership (http://www.bhepp.org) will participate in the Capital Shield 2011 Exercise in October 19th. Ham radio volunteers will be needed to assist this ...
    Posted Sep 29, 2011, 8:05 PM by Victor Cid
  • NIHRAC preparing for hurricane Irene As hurricane Irene threatens the Eastern seaboard, NIHRAC members are preparing to offer volunteer emergency communications servcies to NIH and the Bethesda Hospitals' Emergency Preparedness Partnership (BHEPP) if required during ...
    Posted Aug 27, 2011, 1:04 AM by Victor Cid
Showing posts 1 - 5 of 19. View more »
 
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