Being selected as the Army MARS Region 4 Deputy Director is a great honor for me. As such I aid the Region 4 Director who has overall responsibility, covering 10 states. These are divided into to regions east and west. I am responsible for the east region which covers North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia and Florida. My role is to aid the Region Director with admin and operations within my Region. The MARS program has been around for some 80 years. It involves all three major services (Army, Air Force and Navy/Marine Corp). MARs has traditionally been involved with mars grams from our deployed service men and women to their families. Since the internet and cell phones have come into play, the MARS role has changed to emergency communications in support of Federal Agencies. MARS still handles some mars grams for those who are deployed as it is a great morale booster. MARS members go through a training period and after completion there is continuous training in message handling, proper procedures, different modes of communications to mention a few. At present the program is going through some changes to insure complete interoperability with the other services, and in support of the Federal Government. As a member I was involved in the rescue of three people in New Orleans during Katrina. I am also an alternate net control station for The National Communications System's Shared Resources (SHARES) High Frequency Radio Program. If anyone desires more information on the MARS program, feel free to contact me at n4nwa@embarqmail.com. I will be glad to assist as much as possible. William R Faust (Roadkill)/N4NWA Army MARS Deputy Region Director Region 4 East MARS is keeping me busy. I am no longer the NC State Army MARS Director, I am now the Deputy Region Director East another first for people of our persuasion (that fly in the milk just wont go away). I now am responsible for South Carolina, Georgia, Florida and of course North Carolina. I have the responsibility to make sure all training is done correctly, nets are operated at their scheduled time and operated correctly. In an emergency I am responsible for coordinating all communication within the four states if they are affected and insure that the affected area has comms. If the situation is not within my region I will coordinate with the Deputy Region Director West to give any assistance needed. Emergency Communication (emcom) is the name of the game now. Mars still handles on a secondary basis Health and Welfare traffic for the military but with the advent of cell phones and the internet we don't see a lot of traffic. Although you can go to the Army MARS web site and send a message to any wounded soldier( a great morale booster) over seas. Mars is now tasked by several Federal Agencies to handle communications in an emergency; TSA, DHS to name a few. Roadkill/N4NWA/AAR4QR/AAM4RDE |
| June 1, 2008 |