Anchorage Amateur Radio Club (AARC)

We’d like to offer you a hearty WELCOME, and hope that you’ll find the club inspiring, productive, and fun.

The Anchorage Amateur Radio Club(AARC), call sign KL7AA was organized in 1947, became an Affiliated club with the ARRL on May 12, 1951, and we have over 250 members. We invite anyone with an interest in amateur radio or public service to contact us. The AARC is dedicated to public service and public safety.  AARC also provides auxiliary communications and training to any group or civil authority.

As you may know, the club continues to be busy with outfitting/configuring the Radio Science and Operations Center (RSOC), operating several area analog voice repeaters as well as a DMR repeater, APRS Gateways, Winlink Gateways, a satellite system, a high-speed mesh network, and much more. We support emergency communications through the Amateur Radio Emergency Service (ARES) and operate as a SHAred RESources (SHARES) High Frequency (HF) station in direct support of the State of Alaska Emergency Operations Center (SEOC) as well as the Civil Air Patrol on HF and VHF. Membership dues are $20 per calendar year and are accepted by credit card or PayPal.

The COVID-19 Pandemic has put a damper on some of our in-person activities, but we continue our efforts. Monthly Board of Director meetings, as well as monthly General Membership meetings, are currently being held via Google Meet or Zoom video conferencing sessions, our VEC program is conducting license examinations remotely, and on-site work continues with strict adherence to COVID-19 safety protocols. You can find info on events by checking our calendar on our main webpage at kl7aa.org. We hope to be able to start having on-site activities soon as we start getting a handle on COVID-19.

We’d love to hear of your interests and expectations and hope that you’ll get involved in our many activities and projects. If you have a passion or a particular interest, again, let us know; perhaps you would be willing to be a Champion for a project, or simply wish to assist.

If any of your contact information changes, please let us know so we can update our files. You can send any queries to info@kl7aa.org.

An exciting activity that the club sponsors is the South Central Simplex Net (SCSN). I’d encourage you to participate in the net held on Wednesday evenings starting at 1900 Alaska Time. Information about the SCSN, as well as other local nets can be found here: https://kl7aa.org/nets/

If you are looking for used equipment, the club operates 2 pages that you might find of interest. One is our “Garage Sale” page, and the other is our “Freebies” page. Follow the links to these pages to learn more.

Lastly, we can always use additional support. It costs money to keep the RSOC running, repeater sites operational, to keep the vehicles insured, etc. Unfortunately, membership dues don’t come near to what it takes to cover our expenses. Many projects these days are paid for by members themselves, including board members and others. But we have other ways we are trying to raise money. Here are a few ways you can help, some of which won’t cost you anything directly:

1. Fred Meyer Community Rewards Program: Costs you nothing! Go here to start: https://kl7aa.org/donations/fred-meyer-community-rewards/
2. Vehicle Donation Program: Helps you get rid of junkers! Not just cars! Go here to start: https://kl7aa.org/donations/aarc-rsoc-vehicle-donation-program/
3. Donate Cash: You can donate by PayPal, Credit Card, or check. Go here to start: https://kl7aa.org/donations/cash/

Also, if you are interested in some cool club merchandise (AARC or RSOC), visit our Cafe Press storefront here: https://www.cafepress.com/aarcrsoc

Finally, to keep current on club events and activities, and to get the links to any online events or activities (such as general membership meetings and board meetings), check out our calendar here: https://kl7aa.org/events/

Again, welcome to the club!

73,

Kent Petty, KL5T, Treasurer