THANKS for the excellent reply regarding equipment and license. 
To follow up...IF the SHTF...we all know (assume) that cell phone and/or internet calling will most likely be toast as far as getting through to check on folks or hold conversations.
In the explanation above..does the technician license equipment rely on internet (VOIP) to act as repeater to increase the range of the shorter range equipment?
I am probably not asking the question clearly. I guess I am simply asking if the shorter range equipment would likely to be able to talk long range (eg. Seattle,etc) in time of serious emergency?
No no. It's a great follow on. If there is enough interest, next weekend (enough notice for all) I can set up a Zoom Call on Saturday at a time that may be workable for all.
So to get to the question you asked:
A technician license gives you access to bands that are referred to as VHF/UHF. Much like the old TV's you used to have with two knobs Very High Frequency and Ultra High Frequency. These radios emit a radio wave that travels straight out like a laserbeam. Due to curvature of the earth, this limits their range. Technically the signals travel almost infinitely out into space. As a matter of fact, a licensed Ham can talk with astronauts on the International Space Station using a Baofeng. That's 200+ miles. But on earth because the planet bends away, eventually the horizon is as far as you can talk. My record with a Baofeng hand held 4 watt radio is currently 115 miles. I stood on a hill top near the Bartlett Ranger Station and hit Mt. Lemmon in Tucson. So you can talk radio to radio (called simplex - just think "simple") with two radios and no infrastructure.
But you need "just the right conditions" to get 115 miles. To make these radios more practical, Hams build, own, operate "repeaters" all around the state. I think we have somewhere in the neighborhood of 400+ repeaters. A repeater is put on a mountain top - South Mountain in Phoenix is popular. So is White Tanks and Shaw Butte (near Piestawa). When you look up and see those muntains from 60 miles off, you know you can hit them with a hand held radio. That repeater on that tower, on top of that mountain "repeats" your transmission from the mountain top. And because the South Mountain Repeater can "see" the Shaw Butte Repeater and White Tanks, they can all have a radio link with each other, or be connected via internet VOIP. Repeaters that do not have a line of sight to each other can not link via radio waves and must link via internet / VOIP.
So to answer your question "it depends" but more directly there are roughly three levels of infrastructure for Technicians.
1 - Simplex, my radio to your radio and no further than the horizon. On Earth on the flat flat ocean, the horizon is about 2 or 3 miles away. But from the top of a mountain you can talk to anything you can see and even things that are so far off they are too small to see. It is not uncommon to talk to people 10 to 15 miles away. From my second floor balcony at Tatum and Cave Creek in Phoenix I was able to reach Wickenburg with ease.
2 - Repeaters that are radio linked with other repeaters. One of the best systems in Phoenix is the ARS Metro Link system and then outside of Phoenix is the ARS Rim Link system. a series of interconnected repeaters that can function when the grid is down. They have backup power via batteries, propane generators, and solar.
3 - Repeaters that are linked via VOIP across the internet. These are by far the widest reaching repeaters. They can not see each other because of the horizon so they rely on an internet connection. And they are usually colocated with some backbone internet access at a Microwave tower, but can also be on some guys roof going through his spare computer to the internet. These are the least robust systems because of that dependence on a twisted pair of wires, fiber optics, and other peoples microwave towers. Cancel Culture could easily take this out if they ever realized what it is.
Topic: GT Gallop et al, what is the fastest way to become HAM operational? (Read 1327 times)
