Amateur Radio Field Day event is Saturday and Sunday

AVOCA -- Members of the Murray County Amateur Radio Club will participate in the national

Amateur Radio Field Day exercise Saturday and Sunday at the City Park in Avoca.

Since 1933, ham radio operators across North America have established temporary ham radio stations in public locations during Field Day to showcase the science and skill of Amateur Radio. The Avoca event is open to the public, and all are encouraged to attend.

AVOCA -- Amateurs in most Minnesota cities will practice International Morse Code, voice and digital communications from 1 p.m. to 1 PM Sunday non-stop.The challenge is to send and receive messages to as many stations as possible both in Minnesota and throughout the United States.

For more than 100 years amateur radio, sometimes called ham radio, has allowed people from all walks of life to experiment with electronics and communications techniques, as well as provide a free public service to their communities during a disaster -- all without needing a cell

phone or the Internet. Field Day demonstrates ham radio’s ability to work reliably under any

conditions from almost any location and create an independent communications network. More than 35,000 people from thousands of locations participated in Field Day in 2015.

Although Field Day is not considered a contest, the groups with the most contacts are published in the ARRL’s national magazine.

Anyone may become a licensed amateur radio operator. There are more than 725,000 licensed hams in the United States, as young as 5 and as old as 100. For more information about Field Day, visit www.murraycountyradioclub.com / or www.arrl.org/what-is- ham-radio.