Radio hobbyists like these guys could potentially save our lives in the event
of a nuclear attack or any disaster, really. It turns out there's a lot of
them in Hawaii and we went to spend some time with them. And then this happened.
"A missile may impact on land or sea within minutes. If you are outdoors, seek
immediate shelter in a building. If you are driving, pull safely to the side of
the road and seek shelter in a building." Hey, you guys there? "This is not a drill."
There was a false alarm, nuclear missile. It's insane!
Just go turn on the TV, bye! "Joining us now, MSNBC correspondent Jacob Soboroff. He is
at Waikiki Beach." I have to tell you, David, we have been here the last couple
of days shooting a story. The sirens did not go off, but it does sound like those
push alerts came through to many people's phones. And the story we're
actually doing here for NBC Left Field is, in the case of an electromagnetic
pulse from a blast, 90 percent of people may be without communication and ham radio
is actually one of the ways that you'll be able to hear what's happening because,
again, I was in that room yesterday, inside a bunker, inside the Diamond Head
Crater here on... Yeah. We were in Hawaii during that false alarm. So if this or
any big emergency actually happens, when our cellphones don't work, the internet
goes down, and all else fails, these guys are the communication link. And they
assist a lot of major groups, like Hawaii's Department of Emergency
Management, which isn't just preparing for natural disasters anymore.
We plan all hazards. After the false alarm,
Miyagi resigned, but his message remains. Now, this North Korean missile thing is
unlikely, but it's an elephant in the room, we can't ignore it. It all goes down
in here? It all goes down in here. It's only 20 minutes from the time of launch
to impact. So, God forbid, the call ever came in that a nuclear missile is
heading this way, it's gonna come through this one right here? Yes.
Holy mackerel! Yeah, what deja-vu, man, for those of us who grew up in the Cold War.
You have about a minute or two to authenticate and make a decision to activate the
statewide siren system. Hawaii's been testing this since late last year, and it
was last used during the Cold War. The models show maybe 10 percent, 20 percent casualties.
What about the other 80 percent? Smartphones, and iPads, and all that--we have to accept the
fact that these might not be working after a disaster. Yeah, I can see, thank you.
Ham radio's capability during an emergency is critical. And the ultimate irony is,
it's the technology that's probably been around the longest. That's it. Ok, thank you
very much for the signal report. AH6QO clear. Amateur radio works because
it's radio to radio. No middleman. Modern-day technology is extremely complex and
it has points of failure. If the cell phone tower goes down or just the power
goes off, there's no cell phone.
All I need is a radio, a power source, transmission line up to the antenna, and
I'm on the air.
While this seems like a kind of antiquated, maybe nerdy thing to do,
this is the foundation from which today's communication systems stem. So
your cell phone? It's actually got a lot of radios in it. You just can't control
them. But the thing is, with these, you can. What we have are what we call directional
antennas. So we have a wire right over your head here. From Olomana Gardens
you're gonna hit Chicago, New York. Yeah. Every night. Last night, we're talking to
London. Without satellite dishes? Nothing. Nothing but a piece of wire.
I'm gonna show you this. Glenn, show me your hat!
Tell me if we got the right material here. So in the event an earthquake in
Los Angeles, NBC News supplies us with these radios. You take this and we plug
it into my computer. Yeah. We program all of our local repeaters. You hit my
repeater, you can call California, you can call anywhere in the world.
Over a century ago, while radio itself was emerging as a commercial form of
communication, ham or amateur radio was emerging as a hobby. Amateur comes from
"ama" for "the love of." We do it for love. We don't get paid anything by anybody, it is
total public service. Being a ham operator, you're joining this new
extended family. But the FCC license us and we have rules. It's not a rubber
ducky, no motor caravan kind of thing. Interest over the decades hasn't waned.
But here's the key: of all these hams, there's a sector that is especially
devoted to emergency communications. It's called EMCOMM. One minute you can be
Clark Kent, so to speak, talking to somebody around the other side of the
world, then bang! When there's a disaster, you switch to EMCOMM mode. There's a whole
room at the Department of Emergency Management for the hams who form our
emergency Reserve Corps and emergency. Carter is a trainer for FEMA and Ron is
a coordinator for our state RACES, and Clem is a former HIEMA employee, as
well as an elite amateur. Every morning and every afternoon, they
practice talking to each other. What we're really practicing for is society
collapsing. That's a sick feeling, to be disconnected. Are you worried about an
attack from North Korea? Oh yeah! Yeah. So I got myself a 20-foot mass container.
I could run, and jump in, and slam the doors on it. We're a curious lot, not only being
strange and called geeks etc., and we understand that. You know, when I'm out
with my wife, I try not to wear too many radios on my belt--otherwise she doesn't
want to walk with me. You get a whole bunch of guys from around the world
talking on the same frequency.
Chatting among themselves. Hello, CQ, anyone copy, over? It doesn't get
much better than that. That's the thrill of it. It's the original social media.
Roger that, Frank, thank you very much, we hope to talk to you again later. 73 is
Aloha from Hawaii on the North Shore with the pounding surf down below.
Is there anybody else? You know, you got to think: you're a retired person--I'm a
retired merchant marine captain--you're 68 years old living in a farm out in
Hawaii. You kind of get disconnected. And this
way keeps you in touch. It's a great family out there.
The emergency radio thing gives a great purpose. The radio guy on the Titanic, tapping
out as the ship was going down, still tapping. One little voice can be important.
You can help save the world.
Watch more Left Field stories, including this video on how Japan prepares for a
missile attack.