We went to see Bruce Willis’ new movie this weekend, Live Free or Die Hard and the amount of general radio coverage was very interesting in the movie, especially if you are a ham radio operator or SWL (short wave listener). Apparently there is a large amount of radio type coverage in all the movies, being a new ham I just hadn’t looked that closely before. I did make a few observations from the latest and greatest from Die Hard.
There were several “radio” shots throughout the movie, because of the nature of the movie I guess (end of the modern telecommunications world etc.), but most were factually incorrect and some were just facts. ICOM did have a presence in the movie, real or not, they were ICOM-ish looking radio’s and a huge number of HT’s were used by everyone, but they were often referred to as CB’s regardless of the radio used. Not to surprising as I guess everyone that isn’t familiar with ham radio thinks every radio is a CB radio.
At one point Bruce Willis’ character is talking to Warlock, a cyber hack, and he points to (what is called a CB radio) a radio with a taped sticker on it that says Frequency 66.6, and is later used when Willis is in a 18-wheeler type truck. The radio he used to make a call on 66.6 frequency was not a CB, and the radio station he was calling was not either. It did look much like a modern HF or all band ICOM. Of course the frequency 66.6000 is not a CB frequency. According to the FCC, it is a public TV broadcast frequency (54.000-72.000 – Broadcast TV (channels 2-4) (6 MHz steps – FMw), and the Citizens Band frequency range is 26.965-27.405 (the 11 meter band).
Another observation was the radio in the NYPD unmarked cruiser was set at 144.330 mhz. This frequency is obviously a 2 meter ham band frequency, which falls in the sub-plan of 144.300-144.500, assigned to new OSCAR subband (the satellite repeater links). Apparently there are many people out there that watch movies just to report on the errors made thorughout making the movies. I personally haven’t paid to much attention to that until now when I noticed such a glaring error in the frequency I had to post something about it. I might just have to go watch the others again now.
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I took my Ham Radio license exam, Technician class, about three weeks ago and passed on the first try (thank goodness). We have been waiting for my call sign to be issued and now it is official, I can finally use on the air KI4WLR. I installed another antenna on the house and now we are just trying to figure out the first radio to purchase so I can put this new license to good use. The house is beginning to look like a NASA station of some sort. I can’t wait until we put up the tower. That should be a blast.
Along with the antenna installation we went ahead and got an ICOM 2-meter band radio to start off with. The range of the 2-meter with the antenna installed seems to be very good so far. We have been able to listen to people from north Alabama over to Atlanta and into Mississippi. The 2-meter antenna sits pretty high on our property. Our house is one of the highest points, the roof line itself is almost at the tree line, then add a 20 foot mast and the range from here is quite astounding (to me).
Don’t know what’s next but I am looking forward to the ride.
