Travis County ARES

Chris, KJ5DJC

Cleaning and Disinfection of Shared Devices

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With the current state of social distancing due to COVID-19 and caution over spreading disease, it is important to know how to protect yourself if called to deploy to a hospital, shelter or other facility. Most likely if you are deployed, you will come in contact with items such as pens, phones, computers, radios and other devices that do not belong to you. How do you keep yourself from obtaining or even transmitting a virus? The following procedures are used by our friends at the American Red Cross C★ DST for handling equipment and devices.

What devices: Any device that is touched should be sanitized before handling. It should also be sanitized before returning to the customer. This includes Cell phones, phones, keyboards, laptops, mouses, and touch screens.

Materials: To follow this procedure you will need to have stocked and available:
• Disposable gloves (Latex Free)
• Disinfectant wipes

Sanitizing Procedure

  1. If the device is Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) then ask for permission
  2. Wash your hands (or use hand sanitizer*)
  3. Apply gloves
  4. Shut off the device to be sanitized.
  5. Wipe down the device with a disinfectant wipe.
  6. Remove gloves and wash hands

Gloves can be a great illusion in sanitation. If you touch a contaminated object then the gloves can transmit that. Use gloves to protect your hands from the disinfectant wipes. Some folks are allergic to some disinfectants or perfumes in disinfectant wipes. Where possible use disinfectant wipes which are not perfumed. To learn more about the proper use of gloves, watch the training video from ProTrainings here.

Never spray a device, or use a dripping wet wipe. If you are using a liquid to disinfect then put it on a cloth or swab. You will have to have the device wet to get the desired effect, but you do not want to wet electronic components or cause a short. Stay away from access areas to electronic components such as ear phone jacks and speakers.

Notes:
If hand washing is not available use an alcohol-based hand sanitizer. However, this is not sufficient for Norovirus. CDC showed that facilities that relied on alcohol-based hand sanitizers alone were 6 times more likely to have a Norovirus outbreak. Use Hand Washing wherever possible.

From the CDC “Use disinfecting wipes on electronic items that are touched often, such as phones and computers. Pay close attention to the directions for using disinfecting wipes. It may be necessary to use more than one wipe to keep the surface wet for the stated length of contact time. Make sure that the electronics can withstand the use of liquids for cleaning and disinfecting.” If using a new product, then test first! If you are provided a liquid sanitizing product, use a microfiber cloth (not a paper towel).

Relevant Links:

Credit to Kevin McCoy, IT – Disaster Services Technology, American Red Cross. Kevin has been a stickler for sanitized work stations and equipment for years. His procedure has been adopted on the National Level of the ARC. Historically, the number of volunteers within the Central Texas Region who become ill during deployment are significantly lower when compared to the national average.

The Need for SKYWARN Nets

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Written by Rick Kirchhof – NG5V on 09 September 2015

Texas has strange, unpredictable and often violent weather. Rainfall rates can be much higher here than in other parts of the country. Many people are new the to the Central Texas area and have never seen rain falling so hard that you can’t see the front end of the hood on your car. Rains like this can cause road and bridge flooding, creating deadly risks to people not expecting their car may get washed away. Lightning, hail and high winds all present special risks to people and property.  The National Weather Service has large amounts of data available to it but they don’t have eyes in the field in most cases. Trained weather observers, amateur radio operators and new automated systems like the Austin Flood Early Warning System  (FEWS) add to situational awareness at the NWS. However, more information is needed.

Police, Fire, EMS, Water and Street/bridge teams all report information upward within their organization. Usually this info is only for that team does not travel further or become notices to the public. CERT and other volunteer groups all have additional information but not a quick way to submit it for action. Amateur radio operators are different. Where ever you may be, if you have info about serious or dangerous conditions, hams can get that to someone and drive actions by general reports, or in a special Weather Net.  

Weather nets, held on a wide coverage local repeater, are an Austin tradition going back decades. Hams can provide quality, up to the minute info about what is actually happening in the field. Most of the information flows from the hams, to the weather net, and onward to the NWS or other served agencies who monitor our on-air nets. Sometimes, questions come to the weather net control about conditions in a given area. In this case, the NCS may ask if anyone is observing near a specific locaiton.  

TV and radio stations frequently monitor weather nets to see what events present special risk to the public. Always assume that your transmission to the weather net will be monitored. These are frequently repeated by local weathercasters within minutes of their occurance on the net. Reports must be accurate, specific and include the location and time of the weather event. Do not use the word Tornado unless you are certain that a funnel cloud is in contact with the ground and debris is visible. Skywarn training is invaluable for obtaining skills you need to accurately observe and report weather events.  

Here is proof, read about the unprecedented flooding along Onion Creek
October 2013 is one for the record books. There were a number of rain daiys during the month. Heavy rains fell in the Southern and Eastern parts of Travis county on 10/13 and again overnight into Halloween. You have heard for years the SKYWARN stories about weather in this part of Texas being a series of droughts interrupted by floods.

I had previously listed a number of links for weather and stream/river info elsewhere on this site. One of the best of these is the group of USGS river and stream flow gauges. The list of Texas gauges, grouped by county is found here. This site also has a new mobile device version under development. Read the Mobile Site Tutorial Try it (http://m.waterdata.usgs.gov) from your mobile device! All graphhics in this article are courtesy of the USGS.

Of particular interest is the RATE at which these streams can rise and flood. One night in July, 2012, tiny Walnut creek exploded after multiple rain storms. The result is a threat to everyone downstream. Flows at this rate can mean the end of your life if you slip into the water.


The chart above has no real scale since few people think of river flow in cubic feet/sec. It takes on new meaning when you realize the water flow that flooded the shores of LadyBird Lake after the rainfall was only a little more flow than the Walnut Creek flood.



Both of these are truly outclassed by the historic flooding that occurred along Onion Creek the morning of 10/31/2013. Most of the creeks and streams in the county are either dry or just enough to let your dog play a bit. They can turn into killers like Onion Creek did during the flood.

   

The chart also shows the rain event from earlier in the month. Between these times, Onion Creek, like many of the nearby creeks is either totally dry or something you can find enough rocks to step across with dry shoes. The lesson here is: Creeks can and do rise very quickly. Buildings, equipment, pets and people near them at that time are in grave danger. Many Central Texas residents are new to the area.

Try to share your understanding of water safety and explain the true meaning of “Turn Around, Don’t Drown”.

W5KA Antennas on KVUE Tower

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This is a great diagram of where the 146.94, 224.8 and 444.2 antennas are located. Due to the size and shape of the KVUE tower, some directions work better than others. In addition, each repeater has its antenna mounted in different positions on the platform.

W5RKN prepared this with accurate antenna installation data. It should be very helpful in understanding where and why these repeaters work. The file is a small PDF that may be downloaded here.

Thanks W5RKN!