Military Affiliate Radio System

The messages from U.S. troops in the Persian Gulf come in sporadically, passed along by one specially trained radio operator to another, eventually reaching family members in Orange County hungry for word from their loved ones. The messages, 25 words or less, are usually reassuring, said Dennis Clark, who belongs to a network of radio hobbyists connected to the Military Affiliate Radio System.

The messages from U.S. troops in the Persian Gulf come in sporadically, passed along by one specially trained radio operator to another, eventually reaching family members in Orange County hungry for word from their loved ones. The messages, 25 words or less, are usually reassuring, said Dennis Clark, who belongs to a network of radio hobbyists connected to the Military Affiliate Radio System.

For Jim Fortney, who has been a licensed amateur or "ham" operator for 33 years, the military action in the Persian Gulf is more than just news reports. Each morning before he goes to work at Litton Systems as a technical analyst, or each evening before he retires, Fortney sits at his computer in his residence in the Santa Rosa Valley near Camarillo and transfers messages from Southland families to troops in Operation Desert Storm.

WASHINGTON--Think of ham radio, and the image that crops up may be of a '50s whiz kid building his own receiver, or a retiree tapping out Morse code in some darkened room: at best an antiquated hobby. After all, why bother, when you can chat with someone a world away using the Internet? But that's the thing, amateur radio enthusiasts say; an Internet chat can't compare to an actual conversation with a new friend in a foreign country.