What do I think is Happening with the ChiComFlu?

I’ve had several people ask me what my take is on what is happening with the ChiCom Flu.  Folks this is not going to have more than a few mentions of Amateur Radio, and my thoughts contain both hope & doom, so it your sensibilities require ignoring the downside, perhaps stop reading now?

You may notice I’ve moved my naming of the Chinese Virus, COVID-19, C19, SARS-Cov2, Kung-Flu and Coronavirus to a better descriptive of the “ChiCom Flu.” 

ChiCom Flu captures my thoughts fairly well, origin=China, Perpetrator=CCP (Chinese Communist Party, and mechanism=flu-on-‘roids.

All parties seem pretty clear that the point of origin was Wuhan China no later than December 2019.  Numerous indicators suggest patient-zero (the first known patient) was months before.  In virus cycles various animals (including humans in the case of animal viruses) can act as reservoirs basically storing the virus with minimal harm to the storing host.  While bats and other creatures are being pointed to as reservoirs for the ChiCom Flu reports of finding the virus in the wild are not out there.  Evidence to support the claim of Chinese Bats being either the point of origin or a reservoir are not being support by science at this stage.

Logically we can still assert the point of origin is near Wuhan and that the bat-story is weak.

The CCP (Chinese Communist Party) itself has alleged ChiCom Flu is a virus introduced as a Bio-Weapon (BW) claiming the US Army introduced it to Wuhan.  Look at the CCP claim critically as it undoes their prior PR (or propaganda if you prefer) saying the virus was a natural mutation that came from eating under-cooked bat soup in the Wuhan Wet Food Market.  So suddenly even the Chinese have dropped the “all natural, but nasty” to claim it is a Bio-Weapon.

Our response has to be strong whether a BW or natural, but with the knowledge that the CCP considers it a BW we can basically throw away our usual preconceptions and assumptions about how the ChiCom Flu Virus actually works.

This is not a Drill – COVID-19 Friday Night Net

Posted in several places on the internet is an invitation to a COVID-19 Voice Net.  Expect the folks Bushcrafter , American Partisan, WRSA and perhaps AmRRON may be part of this net.

============================================================
Comm Plan.

Net Name – COVID Watch Net

Pri Freq – 7.243Mhz LSB
Sec Freq – 7.240Mhz LSB (down 3Khz)**
Alt Freq – 7.237Mhz LSB (down 3Khz)**

Start time – 0200Z Sat 28 Mar (27 Mar Fri 2100 CDT)

All stations be prepared to relay. Any station able to relay must be in
contact with NCS or Alt NCS. Use of amplifiers is desired.

**Net Control Station (NCS) moves to Sec Freq if Pri freq is
occupied or splatter is occurring at the NCS location. In the event the
Sec freq is occupied or is unworkable continue down to Alt frequency. If
Sec freq is used start time will be 2105z and if conditions require the
Alt freq use then start time will be 2110z. Minor adjustments in
operating freq may be required based on usage by other operators or nets.

End of Comm Plan.
=================================================================

As I am not much of a net person, I may not be on it.  Maybe just listening.

73

Steve
K9ZW

Thoughts of wonderment in a crazy world

If one were to watch the news, we’re in the midst of a challenge of a lifetime.

[EDIT since first posting this Wisconsin has started the process to “shut down” with a “Safer at Home” order]

If one were to watch just the MSM (Mainstream Media) it is roll over and die.

But if one is a stand up person, it is just a challenge and we’re going to prevail.  

Actually call that “winning” to be more accurate.

Because the majority of reader here are Radio Amateurs – the folk who dig a bit deeper into making communication happen in a direct fashion – most of you already know that we will not follow the MSM and lay down  just to let events run us over.

The HF bands are awesomely busy with people AROUND THE WORLD who are home and can be on the air.

Dickens in The Tale of Two Cities started with 

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times,

it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness,

it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity,

it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness,

it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair,

we had everything before us, we had nothing before us,

we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way – in short,

the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received,

for good or for evil,

in the superlative degree of comparison only.”   

 

from A Tale of Two Cities , Charles Dickens, 1859 https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/A_Tale_of_Two_Cities

 

Yes, there are two sides, and it is up to embrace either the doom or the opportunity.

Paying Chinese Virus Attention – Logistics in a Ham’s World

Here we are Friday March 20th 2020 well into our response to the Chinese Virus pandemic.  An awful lot has changed and a lot is still the same.  Some summaries:

Direct Chinese Virus Responses:

Family and friends who are worried are as prepared as they can be for a “Staycation” if a shelter-in-place directive comes.  (Maybe I should say “when it comes”?)  Have some who are in denial and basically shutting down any discussion.  Hopefully among us we have a bit of extra to cover them when reality overcomes their sensibilities.  I’ve divided preparations between factual capabilities, feel-good capabilities and mental hygiene capabilities.  Examples of factual are the couple weeks of extra food, making sure prescriptions are filled, and bringing in anything we NEED to have a Staycation.  Feel-Good examples are figuring out how to maintain variety in diet while not being able to buy fresh, buying in some lumber for a workshop project I hadn’t intended to start until later this Spring, and filling all gas cans/tanks with fuel – things we WANT but perhaps really don’t need.  In the mental-hygiene class is after listening to each family member on what worries them – what in their mind moves WANTS to NEEDS in their minds – and sorting that out.  My mother relaxed a notch when family stocked ahead lots of reading and puzzle-books, the XYL when I dug out our old DVDs and a DVD player in case the internet (read:  lifeline of the 2020 Staycation) were to go down.  So the classes really are FACTUAL NEEDS, WANTS, and PERCEIVED NEEDS.

REPOST “With Varying Frequency” Technical and Housekeeping

REPOST from March 17th 2011 – any updates are in Brackets – Italics from July 2019 and other from March 2020

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Some thoughts on how “With Varying Frequency” runs:

Quoted Materials:

A kind person pointed out that a recent post was unclear in attribution, leaving the possibility that a reader wouldn’t know what was quoted and what I wrote, and they were right!

WordPress allows several tools to create Bog Posts, and I’ve been using several of them. One that is quite useful to share other web content, “Press It,” handles quoted material differently than expected – guess reading the directions before use would help!

Ham Radio in a New Chinese-Virus World

This evening, at the end of the first day of the Chinese-virus National Emergency, once the tasks at hand settled down there is a few moments to reflect on ham radio.

Following the declaration of the National Emergency locally our Wisconsin Governor shut all schools for about a four week initial period, the nursing home my mother is in went to complete lock-down making the lunch we shared on Wednesday a special event, my work team looked to me for leadership in several ways, our college aged sons appeared – one to stay as his finishes his last degree coursework online and one to stock up and return to his apartment,  we started reaching out to the elderly & fragile among our friends who lack family to help asking if they needed anything, and hours were spent preparing communications to employees.