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While not really a site for us, the Miami-Dade Emergency Operations Center has been home for our Association for many years. The old Dade County EOC is located at 5600 SW 87 Ave. Or the SW corner of Miller and Galloway Roads. It was built as a Cold War era bomb shelter in 1959. In 2000, the EOC will moved to a new building on NW 41st Street. This building will become a back up 911 center. Check out the Historical Pictures section for some great shots of this facility. Click on the buttons above to see the pictures. MAPS A map of the area around the old EOC. SR913 is really SW 87 Ave., a.k.a. Galloway Road. The EOC is located just SW of the intersection of Miller and Galloway.
Here's an aerial view of the EOC. Starting at the intersection, going down, or South, is the EOC, 911, Potter's field, and the start of Station 13. If you look carefully, you can see the shadow of the tower behind Station 13. This picture from the USGS is fairly current. We're working on a 1960's aerial view of the same area.
Here's a history of the Miami-Dade Police Department. And a History of 911
Some information found while searching the net: From http://www.mcb.co.uk/services/conferen/jun96/disaster/coile/coile.htm Hurricane Andrew, Homestead, Florida, August 22, 1992 "Hurricane Andrew was a catastrophic American disaster. The local and State emergency response forces were overwhelmed. Forty people were killed and 130,000 homes damaged. More than 250,000 people were left homeless. There were 630,000 people evacuated. Four million people were without electricity and water. There were 117,000 telephones out of commission. "Some of the problems in Hurricane Andrew were: command & control confusion; inadequate damage assessment; 30,000 Military arrived late; too much unexpected mutual aid; unexpected donations caused problems; lack of emergency power generators; lack of emergency water and food; fire engines could not operated in winds greater than 70 mph; no wind measurements; and the National Hurricane Center radar, computer, & satellite communications failed during storm. "QST had an article describing Hurricane Andrew amateur radio operations in Florida in its December 1992 issue, (Kandel, 1992). RACES hams had been mobilized before the hurricane and were on station inside the Dade County Emergency Operations Center, a 1950 nuclear vault-like shelter. The shelter building survived the hurricane, but six of seven antennas and towers did not. VHF antennas which the County, the Red Cross and the School Board were supposed to have installed long ago on schools earmarked for shelters had not been installed. Luckily, one amateur radio repeater in Miami, 35 miles out of the severely damage area, had survived. "About 150 amateurs came from all over Florida to help in Dade County. Hams kept the EOC in constant contact with the State of Florida EOC in Tallahassee, 500 miles away. One amateur radio operator was struck by lightning and killed as he was providing communications for a helicopter unloading food supplies. Another ham in a shelter reported by radio that the hurricane wind had increased and that the roof of the gymnasium was lifting five feet off the building during gusts. He helped evacuate the shelterees to lower floors after breaking open some locked doors. The roof eventually blew off. This was the worst hurricane to hit this part of South Florida in 27 years. Amateur radio operators supported more than 80 city,county, state, and federal agencies for nine days."
You may remember this storm: Date: Wed, 3 Jan 1996 16:34:08 -0600
A bio on our OEM Chief, Chuck Lanza
Date: Fri, 12 May 2000 09:21:34 -0700 From: "Rick Sherman" <rick@vcc.com> Subject: Re: very first ham radio repeater on 2 meters The following is clipped from the Newsline website: http://www.arnewsline.org/newsline_archives/cbbs957.txt If you have ever used a ham radio repeater, then you owe a debt of gratitude to a California ham named Arthur M. Gentry, W6MEP. Back in the late 1940's Art Gentry began experimenting with advanced receiver designs of that era that led to the development of the first practical ham radio repeater. His system, using the call sign K6MYK, came on the air in the early 1950's from atop Mt. Lee. That's the hill overlooking Los Angeles that is home to the famous Hollywood sign. Every repeater on the air today can literally trace its ancestry back to the early experiments of W6MEP. But time has taken its toll on Art's health. A few years ago, he turned over the day-to-day operation of the system to his longtime friend Bill Arens, N6NMC: Also see: http://webhome.idirect.com/~jproc/ve3fab/gentry.html Rick Sherman
If you have ANY information to add to this site, please e-mail your web master, Ray Vaughan, KD4BBM 07/15/03 |
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