Ham Radio – A contact sport

Our community was on the national news several times over the past few weeks due to the weather.  Central Iowa was hit with record-breaking rainfall this summer (after one of the snowiest winters on record). The result was severe flooding and millions of dollars in damages impacting Ames & Des Moines.

My QTH is just west of Ames at a higher elevation – so “floods” weren’t the issue.  Unfortunately, our house was linked to a drain tile system that had clogged resulting in 24 inches of water in the basement.  We’ve had to replace several things including our hot water heater, HVAC controls, and many loose ends. The good news is that we’re now disconnected from the tile system so this shouldn’t be an issue in the future.

As far as ham radio equipment flood damage – there were a few causalities:

• Office cubical  – as my ham shack is in a cold/unfinished basement, I’ve installed office “cube walls” which give the shack a warmer feel and better sound insulation from the cold concrete walls. The water destroyed the walls and most likely the desk.
• A bunch of things I didn’t use too often but were nice to have:
  • FT-530 Yaesu HT
  • MFJ 259 Antenna Analyzer with most accessories
  • Many kits and projects in various states (K1EL keyer for example)
  • Hundreds of books and magazines (CQ/QST)
  • QSL cards (ouch). I saved many, but lost some of my first DX cards.
  • Cables, connectors, adapters, etc.

The IC-7600, IC-746 and rotor controller were rescued. It was a bit scary putting on hip-waders to walk through 24″ deep water and carry the IC-7600 past floating couches and debris.

Of course, we’re thankful that we didn’t have more damage than we did. It certainly could have been worse.

I guess this is my opportunity to rebuild the station from the ground up (more or less). New walls & desk, new chair, and a new layout seem likely before I can get into the contest season.