Radio Rant
Time for the annual radio rant.
The use of radios in the Upper Basin is broken. Here are some of the problems, and even some ideas for solutions.
First is that some people just need to realize that you can't always broadcast in your own speaking voice. Sometimes you've got to speak up to be heard. If you are broadcasting and can't be heard, you are wasting everybody's time and batteries, including your own. It's frustrating to have the radio adjusted so that most people's broadcasts are at a reasonable volume, then not be able to hear calls because some people insist on not speaking up.
The worst part is that even after they've been told that they can't be heard, these people do not make any effort to change their habits. It's inconsiderate on their part, unless their goal to to talk into a box and every time they do, they have people call back asking what they'd just said.
A similar problem is poor reporting. If you are going to start calling out activity at Fan & Mortar (or Giant, should it ever wake up), you've got to follow through. People are making decisions on whether or not they are headed down based on your calls. Long periods of radio silence are worse than too much information. Silence makes one wonder what is going on, or if that just means the opportunity has passed.
A few years ago I pointed out that just calling Beehive's Indicator at the start was not enough. A person could miss the first call, and end up not seeing Beehive. (I speak from experience, as that was prompted by having missed a call by being in the shower.) The simple remedy is to announce that the Indicator was "ie" at about 5 minute intervals. Most people are doing that these days, and it's nice to hear.
Also, is it really necessary to yell out geyser times at the exact moment the eruption begins? A couple of times these past few weeks I've heard people have to retract their calls when it turns out that Oblong or Depression or Aurum wasn't really starting. And misidentification is inexcusable. You can wait a few moments to be sure that the steam cloud you see is Riverside start, and not a Grand that erupted two hours ago.
Another problem is early morning radio calls. There are people who want to get up in the night, or early morning, for Beehive or Fan & Mortar (or Giant or Giantess…). They leave their radios on at night, for those possibilities. But they don't care about Riverside or Daisy or Plume or Old Faithful. Or most of all, requests to "switch to five". The rule of thumb should be that until 07:00 or so, the only announcements should be those that would cause people to change their day, or to see something erupt.
It's scary, but by that criteria, Oblong and Fountain might qualify…) But if that's what people find useful.
And now we come the the real problem: The National Park Service and its Visitor Education Center [sic] personnel.
Here's what usually happens: Someone shouts out a geyser time. A few moments later comes a call from the Cathedral asking for a repeat of what was just said. If lucky, they'd understand the first response, but far too often they'll say the response was garbled or unreadable or they'll repeat back the wrong information, thus starting the cycle again. So what started as yelling into the aether turns into an Abbott and Costello routine.
Sometimes they don't acknowledge, and then a half hour later you get a request for information about Daisy, or Riverside, or Grand. This will start an exchange as before. Or, they'll hear some body ask about a geyser, and interpret that as an eruption call, again setting off a cascade of back-and-forth.
Add into all this the reported attitude that those managing the Cathedral (the rectors?) really don't care about the geysers, and if reports are accurate, believe that they don't really need anyone other than paid staff to do a good job. Why do people want to tolerate or enable such an attitude to continue?
The solution is simple. The Cathedral should have its own channel. Any information for them would be sent on that channel. Ideally, one would ask for their attention, get it, and then give them the geyser eruption time or info.
If their book doesn't have a Daisy time, the the reason is either a) they didn't answer the attempts to give it to them b) it hasn't erupted yet, or c) no one saw it.
People could still shout into the current channel at the very start, but they'd do so knowing that they should not get any response. No longer would that have to ask what's going one after every trivial broadcast of "switch to five". It would be true that reporting information would not be as free and easy anymore, and would require a little more effort, and that's going to be the excuse for most people not doing something like this.
If the radio situation got cleaned up, I might even participate beyond announcements of F&M in the middle of the dark.