Marion Baptist Association Starts Marion Mesh Initiative
Marion Baptist Association is helping churches and community members to stay connected in the event of disaster related communication outages. The association is organizing the Marion Mesh Initiative - a county-wide effort to connect people and organizations through an off-grid text message system known as Meshtastic. Meshtastic uses inexpensive, low-power, long-range radios to send and receive text messages, gps, telemetry and environmental data without the use of the internet or cell service.
The LoRa (long-range) radios form an instant, ad-hoc communication mesh once activated. Each device acts as a node in the mesh which allows text messages to hop from one device to another to cover long distances. As new devices are activated by individual users, the mesh is strengthened. Some devices serve as routers and repeaters, which help to extend the mesh even further.
The Marion Baptist Association is encouraging its 67 member churches to purchase and install solar nodes on high places on church roof-tops, steeples, and other high locations that allow the UHF LoRa radios to transmit and receive messages with greater efficiency. The project started when Pastor Austin Tucker of Gracepointe Church in Summerfield approached the Associational Mission Strategist with the idea of local churches serving their individual communities by building mesh networks.
The association has added Mestastic to its emergency communication plan and has encouraged member churches to do so as well. However, noting that there are very few Meshtastic users and a small number of nodes in Marion County, there is a need for an organized community effort to encourage greater participation by working together to build an organized mesh network in Marion County.
Inspired by the effectiveness of the Austin Mesh Project, the Marion Baptist Association started holding bi-monthly community meet-ups in March of 2026 where Meshtastic users and others interested in the Marion Mesh Initiative could gather together, enjoy a cup of coffee and discuss best practices for using these small devices to provide a powerful community communication service when disasters strike.
