ON TARGET - July 16, 1994
Coach Loren Francis
This is the first year for me and our team to participate in "On Target". We spent a couple of evenings talking about the program, making our hand signal mirrors and practicing signaling. Most of the boys were enthusiastic about participating and we had commitments from 8 out of our 9 team members. But as the date approached, on-by-one, most of the boys dropped out. By Wednesday before July 16, we were down to 2 boys able to go. Some phone calls to parents eventually produced 2 more, and by the morning of the program, we had 4 boys and 2 leaders going. I also tried to find a ham radio operator for the trip. I called 6 or 7 people who operate ham radios. Each one had a reason for not being able to com and a referral to another one or 2 people to call. I finally gave up.
We left Nampa at 8:00am Saturday, July 16 and drove up to the top of Deadwood Peak at 10:45am. there is a lookout tower there with a balcony all around it. We set up our tripod with the 4-8" square mirrors attached (total area of 16"x16"). We had some difficulty with the attachment of the mirrors to the tripod but after a few minutes, we got it to work ok. We oriented our maps, pointed out the mountains where the other varsity teams were supposed to be, and practiced signaling a couple of them. The closest mountain was Scott Mountain (5.9 miles, bearing 295 degrees from us). The angle of the sun wasn't very good for signaling so we had the boys just use the hand mirrors to signal there. Later, after the sun moved a bit, we tried the large mirror again (almost 1pm) but got no return signal. The boys thought they could see some small flashes from Scott Mountain about 11:25am, and they signaled back with the hand mirrors. I never did see anything from Scott Mountain, however, the boys reported little tiny flashes on several occasions. At 11:36am, we received a very bright signal from Pilot Peak (bearing 158 degrees). No mistaking that one - it was like a lighthouse beacon! We returned the signal there for about 5 minutes and they continued to signal to use for a couple of minutes. Then at 11:51am we received a strong bright signal from Squaw Butte (bearing 242 degrees). This is over 36 miles away but there was no mistaking the signal. I felt sure we could have seen a signal 50 or 60 miles away if the line of sight was unobstructed. Two of the mountains - Thorne Creek Butte and Indian Mountain were not visible from Deadwood Peak because other mountains were in the way.
The highlight for me was just after noon. At 12:12pm, I started sending signals to Shafer Butte (bearing 200 degrees). After 8 minutes we got a signal back from them. This was the first time that we got a signal after we had initiated the signal. We tried the direction of Granite Mountain (bearing 122 degrees) several times but we were not sure which mountain it was. Finally, I spent several minutes with the topographic map looking at terrain features and finally pinpointed where their signal should have been coming from. It turned out to be quite a low peak and difficult to make out. But we did get a signal from them at 12:28pm. A couple of bright flashes, then a couple of smaller flashes. Not as distinct as Pilot, Squaw, or Shafer mountains but unmistakable nonetheless. We spent 10 minutes signaling them back (12:30-12:40pm) but didn't see any more signals.
We tried to send signals to Hawley Mountain from 12:00 to 12:12pm and 12:44-12:56pm but didn't see any return signal from them.
All-in all, I thought it was a successful day, having received signals from 5 out of 6 possible mountains.
Loren J. Francis
We came, we saw, and we signaled. That was about it. When we arrived at the Deadwood lookout station, we looked at our map, checked our compasses and found the peaks that we were likely to get a signal from. Loren, our leader, had already plotted the direction and distance of these peaks so it made it all the easier for us. As we set up our large mirror, we practiced signaling with the small mirrors by flashing each other. As we surveyed the horizon watching for random flashes, we noticed several larger flashes in the distance. It remained me of a motorcycle with it's headlight on and coming over a hill on a foggy evening. It was our first undeniable signal, and now the trip was not a complete failure. We signaled back to them and they returned it. We had established communication. Eventually we began to receive flashes from other peaks, and we were again surprised by the clarity of a mirror signal from over thirty miles away. Our biggest disappointment was that we didn't receive any really definite signals from Scott Mountain. which was only about 6 miles away. We did however, see a lot of small random flashes from that direction. All-in-all it was more successful than I had thought it would be, but not as much as I had hoped. Next year will probably be better.
Carl Mortenson
We drove up to our mountain and arrived there a little before 11:00am. We practiced a little and flashed Scott Mountain with the little mirrors. We got a few small ones from them. For the remainder of the day, we received and sent signals from various mountains. The funniest part for me was learning to use signal mirrors.
Brandon Adamson
I think the On Target event was fun. I was kind of upset when I learned about it because I am in my 2nd year of Varsity Scouts and I didn't get a chance to do it last year. I think it was really fascinating to be able to communicate indirectly to people a long way away. It was especially fun with the turnout we got - 5 out of 6 available mountains.
Timothy Francis
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