At a field training area here on June 9, Army Maj. Gen. Stephen R. Hogan, the Adjutant General of Kentucky, picked up the hand microphone of a military radio and spoke into it.
A few moments later, Hogan heard Army Sgt. James Hall’s reply through the radio’s loudspeaker from the Wendell H. Ford Regional Training Center in Greenville, Kentucky.
This exchange was proof that the radio retransmission, the “Shot Heard Across the Bluegrass,” was a success.
The new radio capability can provide Kentucky with another means of communication between key locations in case of emergency, officials said.
The event was planned and led by Army Capt. Stephen Young of the Kentucky Army National Guard's 2nd Battalion, 138th Field Artillery Brigade. The joint engagement also included the 138th Signal Company, the 63rd Theater Aviation Brigade (Hall’s unit), and members of a small Kentucky town.
The goal was to establish a radio network using Single Channel Ground and Airborne Radio System FM radios to link Fort Knox and the regional training center that’s located roughly 90 miles away.
It was the first time Kentucky signal soldiers built such a network using SINCGARS gear. This also marked the longest recorded radio shot using the standard unit-issued radio configuration within Kentucky.
“As signal soldiers, units rely on us to keep up lines of communication,” Young said. “This test was an example of making the most out of what you’re given with standard equipment. The components we used are basic, issued to all units. We proved that they work, and that we can even extend their capability beyond what we have in the past.”
For many years, the Kentucky National Guard communications and signal community have partnered in efforts to establish an FM radio shot between Fort Knox and the regional training center.
According to Young, these radio systems, while highly durable and mobile, have limited range. The gear’s limitations necessitated intermediate transmission extension nodes to complete the radio shot.
Young gathered a team of signal soldiers from the 138th to attempt the connection during the battalion’s annual training held June 3-18. The team needed to erect radio antennae in three locations off-post between Fort Knox and the regional training center to accomplish this feat. The middle retransmission site was established in the front yard of the Jones family home in Rineyville, Kentucky, with the family’s permission.
The day after the successful test, Army Lt. Col. Andrew Bates, the 2nd Battalion, 138th Field Artillery Brigade commander, visited the Jones family and presented a battalion coin to homeowner Robert Allen Jones Sr. as a token of gratitude.
“The Jones family’s willingness to let some strangers from the National Guard set up an antenna RETRANS site in their front yard is one of my favorite parts of this accomplishment,” Bates said. “It shows the trust between the Kentucky National Guard and local citizens of the commonwealth.”
This RETRANS event was not the main training event for the joint team. They also provided signal support in the form of four other redundant communication networks at Fort Knox, which the artillery units of the 2-138 used as they fired their Paladin howitzers during live-fire exercises.
“The Army is asking us to do more with less”, Young said. “Through team members’ hard work, leaders’ effective planning, joint integration/cooperation, and even friendly support from Kentucky’s community members, that is precisely what the team has achieved.”
Young gave credit to the members of his team of citizen-soldiers for their long hours of work, skills, enthusiasm and sacrifice.
“These soldiers are required to work harder than ever before, and they do so without complaint,” he said.