What if it's you tomorrow ?

[John W4IVW]

No one Cares Unless It's Them, April 2, 2008

I had to stop and think what I could call this little story and
finally said I would call it like it is. At the strong urging of
several of my amateur friends I now tell this story. Hopefully it
might help to keep too many other amateurs from losing their licensed
rights to operate in the ham bands desired to big money corporations
and cure a lack of support from people and laws that are supposed to
protect the amateur's licensed privileges.

This story is about the reasons why I am giving up on ham radio. It is
certainly not because I want to but because a large CATV company has
forced me to shut down my station... not because I'm causing
interference but because of the horrendous level of interference I now
receive from CATV on the allocated amateur frequencies I choose, enjoy
and prefer to operate on. I am thoroughly disgusted and very bitter
with the outcome of my efforts to seek relief from the interference.

Up until or about January 18, 2007, I had absolutely no interference
what-so-ever; I must repeat, I had no interference what-so-ever from
the CATV company's system here in Indian River County, Florida. I
went to participate in the ARRL VHF contest in mid -January of 2007
and found that the frequencies I wanted to use were buried in a
continuous 20dB over S9 signal level of some kind.

I did a lot of searching with my equipment and found that the primary
source of interference was being transmitted on 145.250 MHz which
happens to be CATV channel 18. This channel as with all cable
channels I understand have a bandwidth of 6 MHz. Need I say more what
that does to weak signal Dxing. Tuning through the 2 meter band area
I normally operate indicated harmonics of various signal strengths and
band widths originating from the original frequency. Signal strengths
on the primary CATV channel 18 (145.250 MHz) at my location are at
full S-meter scale most of the time with harmonics above and below the
primary frequency.

I further investigated other CATV channel frequencies that might be in
or near the other two primary bands that I utilize for weak signal and
satellite Dxing. I was alarmed when I found the same interference on
the UHF ham bands as well. My guess at the time was it was from CATV
channel 59 (433.250 MHz), channel 60 (439.250 MHz) and channel 61
(445.250 MHz) and others. The 6 meter band had some lower level
signals that most likely were harmonics from CATV channels above and
below the 6 meter band. The harmonics were there most likely from
what I truly believe were "new" transmission strength levels needed
for growth that suddenly appeared mid-January of 2007 at my location
area. The poor condition of the CATV cable distribution system in my
opinion is now leaking it's signal.

Before I go on with this story, let me state that any individual,
group, ARRL officials, FCC officials or any CATV company official that
does not believe what I have stated so far, may visit the area with
their own detection equipment and see and hear for themselves what has
forced me to lose my FCC licensed rights to operate in the allocated
two meter amateur and 70 cm bands. You will not need any fancy
detection equipment or antenna systems.

To continue this story which I will make every attempt to minimize
it's length, I took extensive measures to record tons of data of the
actual interference signals. These were audible recordings in
different modes (fm, usb, cw, etc.) and visual recordings. This
documentation was on going and involved all the frequencies and more
that I have not mentioned. Samples are available to those requesting
by email as I have also kept and maintained every written word and
email by those involved in this fiasco.

I decided that I would personally take samples of this documentation
to the office of the local CATV "Network Operations Supervisor" and
discuss "their problem" with him. His eyes widened as he viewed and
listened to the evidence. I explained that it was my desire to allow
him reasonable time to do whatever is required to mitigate "their
problem" promptly. I also mentioned that I was also heavily involved
in ARES emergency communications in our county and that I was out of
service. I also notified the CATV company corporate office as well.

I also was very clear in stating that I never had interference from
CATV until mid-January of 2007. I also made it quite clear that it
was my desire to cooperate and not notify the FCC. He stated that he
did not want the FCC involved either. I offered all my assistance
required to help out and left.

The results were CATV Engineers and the CATV Supervisor in my home
with their test equipment to see for themselves several times over. I
kid you not when I say their comment to each other the first visit was
"we've got a problem".

In short, a show was put on for me. I was told that this did not occur
suddenly as I originally stated but had been occurring slowly over the
years because of bad CATV cable connections. From absolutely no
interference to the signal strength at my location slowly happening
just did not happen slowly! One day clear frequencies and the next
overwhelming interference! The show goes on....

After weeks of trucks and CATV technicians performing all kinds of
tests and my actual going out and locating cable system leaks for them
and building and supplying a yagi antenna, I gave up and filed an
official, extremely well documented complaint with the FCC. I
explained that I had made strong personal effort to co-operate and
assist the CATV company. Although some lessening of the interference
level did occur for a short while, sadly enough it soon returned at
full strength.

Shortly after filing my official complaint, I had an official FCC
Enforcement Bureau investigation team from the FCC field office in
Tampa, Florida in my home in mid March of 2007 with their
sophisticated test equipment and they saw for themselves what I have
been talking about. I won't go into a lot of detail but they made
several visits, set up temporary towers and antennas to locate the
source in addition to extensive drive testing in the area.

The end result is anybody's guess. They most likely will say that they
could not locate or detect any problem interference for what I
perceive to be obvious reasons and declare it legal. Yet they saw the
problem on their test equipment in my home and I witnessed it. By the
way, my home and any equipment, systems or whatever was cleared as an
emission source.

No further action that I am aware of was taken by the FCC or the CATV
company. I never received any kind of an FCC report. It was however
suggested by an FCC official that I go to another amateur band.
Additionally, I also notified all the top officials of the ARRL
repeatedly and also explained the event at our local amateur club in
the presence of our section leader and displayed samples of visual and
audible proof. As far as the CATV company was concerned, their system
was not causing my interference and their investigation was completed.

I have had no response to my continuing to email current proof of the
ongoing interference documentation to the FCC, all the ARRL officials
and a field technician for the CATV company who in himself is also a
local radio amateur. I generally sent current documentation every
couple of weeks. Since my last emails of continued interference
documentation to enforcement and ARRL officials were returned to me as
un-delivered, indicated a very important message to me personally
indeed. Now totally disgusted, very bitter and I am giving up my
futile attempts.

A very sad part of this event is that there were several other
amateurs experiencing the same problems, one of which also filed an
official complaint with the FCC. To the best of my knowledge, he never
was contacted about his complaint by the FCC.

My attempts to get all those other affected amateurs together for
mutual support and go to the FCC, the ARRL officials and the CATV
company failed and I was left alone to battle this problem. Their
feeling was that no one will care to help, you can't fight city hall,
you can't win against big business and all the other excuses of
futility... most sad of all as it may be, some just didn't care! What
they are doing about the interference problem now I have no idea. At
least I had the intestinal fortitude to try even if it was alone.
Mutual support from the local amateur community turned out to be a
total failure.


Today, for the 15th month in a row, I am still off the air as the
interference is still there stronger than ever. Any amateur can drive
around anywhere in Indian River County, Florida, with a two meter rig
tuned to 145.250 MHz and detect the interference for themselves. Why
I ask ? Because nobody cares.

To put an end to this story, I am in the process of selling my amateur
equipment. I have resigned from ARES and from being the technical
officer and participating in emergency functions as I have done over
the years. I hate to think of how many hours I have put in not only
preparing for hurricane emergencies but providing emergency
communications for our local hospital many times over. I have also
contributed many personal hours to improving emergency amateur
communication systems in our county for our citizens.

As for the past 15 months, I have had my ability to operate on
frequencies that I have FCC licensed rights to do so taken away from
me by one of the largest CATV companies and as the story title says,
"No One Cares Unless It's Them". I ask myself why, why must this
happen? Because no one cares.

I just don't know what else to say other than to remind all amateurs
that if you stand alone you will lose but if you stand together you
will at least have a chance to win. My situation should be a fair
example of what happens to the individual if he seeks support from
those that are supposed to protect his FCC licensed rights. Simply
put, "No One Cares Unless It's Them".



73 to all.

John E. Conefrey W4IVW Vero Beach, Florida

Updated 4-2-08