This afternoon a small vegetation fire broke out in Camp Pendleton. It didn't amount to much in the end (from what I can gather, they wound up letting it burn out as it threatened no structures). Anyway, it was interesting to me for how it was handled radio-wise.
Firstly, Camp Pendleton Fire announced it on VFIRE 21 (154.280MHz with a CTCSS of 156.7Hz) and immediately did a role call to surrounding agencies for acknowledgement! They did state that they were not requesting any assistance a this time. Maybe they've been doing this for a while but it is the first time I have noticed it. The surrounding agencies who they polled included Orange County Fire, Monte Vista (CDF San Diego County), Cleveland National Forest, NORCOM (San Diego County North County Dispatch JPA), and Perris (CDF Riverside County). The only one who did not respond was Perris.
I found this interesting and, overall, a good practice. Given the recent multi-fire incidents in north county with some on Camp Pendleton spreading into the surrounding counties, I think it is wise for Camp Pendleton (who operates primarily on their own federal P25 trunked system within the base and much of that voice traffic is encrypted, even the fire traffic) to use a nationally designated civilian VHF frequency to keep the outside agencies informed and to then poll those agencies for acknowledgment! Interestingly, they then began working the fire using a San Diego County controlled civilian frequency for command (XSD North Command) and a VFIRE frequency for tactical (VFIRE 22). I couldn't hear the tactical simplex traffic but could easily hear the XSD North Command repeater.
Now the bad - at least from my listening it appears that Camp Pendleton Fire, at least, needs to work on their VHF civilian radio channel programming and/or procedures. They repeatedly had problems communicating with the units in the field on the XSD North Command channel. The thing is - as far as I could tell, I heard all of the units calling each other but they didn't seem to hear each other much of the time. Primarily, it was "Pendleton Fire" trying to talk to the IC on scene. The on-scene unit apparently switched input tones and finally could get through but even after that it was very sporadic. I have that frequency in carrier squelch mode with CTCSS search activated. I noticed that frequently (but not always) the base ("Pendleton Fire") would transmit with a tone on the repeater output while the field unit never did. I am guessing that the system is set up like the CDF and USFS systems such that a different repeater could be activated by using the correct tone on the input. However, I could not discern a noticeable change on the repeater signal level when they did this (but it could just be different remote receivers with one primary transmitter). At one point the field unit seemed to get pretty frustrated because of the problems. By the way, the problem seemed to work both ways - sometimes it was the field unit repeatedly calling and not getting a response from the base and sometimes it was the base repeatedly calling and not getting a response from the field unit. They wound up switching back to the trunked system repeatedly because they couldn't rely on the XSD North Command repeater(s). It sounded like they repeatedly kept trying to return back to XSD North Command but it remained sporadic in terms of effectiveness.
I don't monitor the Camp Pendleton UHF trunked system much these days because it is a true P25 system and they use a lot of encryption, even on the fire talk groups. In many cases, some users are clear but the folks they are talking to are encrypted (of course the user radios are programmed to decrypt any encrypted traffic as well as pass any clear traffic so it's all transparent to the users). For me, this makes listening to this system difficult and annoying because my only P25 capable scanners are GRE types which do not mute encrypted traffic on full P25 systems (they will on mixed mode older systems like the County RCS but not on true P25 systems like what Camp Pendleton uses) so I have to hear all of the encrypted garble in order to hear the occasional clear voice traffic. In this case, Pendleton Fire (base) was always encrypted while the field units were sometimes encrypted and sometimes not.
Anyway, I have some questions concerning the XSD North Command channel system for the folks-in-the-know (Don?):
1) How extensive a network is that system composed of in terms of multiple repeaters and/or remote bases, and/or remote receivers?
2) Is any of the network hardware located on the Marine base itself or is it all located outside of the base (I assume the main stuff is likely on Palomar Mountain)?
3) Is it going to remain such that the output frequency of the repeater(s) will be either without CTCSS or with various CTCSS tones or is there some future plan to put a common tone on the output with multi-tone access on the input as is now done on the CDF and USFS repeaters?
It sounded to me, during this small incident, that Pendleton Fire was "trying" to use XSD North Command as might have been dictated by a well meaning and theoretically logical plan but kept going back to their primarily "closed" base trunked system when they couldn't reliably or consistently use the XSD North Command repeater(s).
If there really were issues (again, all I can state is how it SEEMED to me from my listening), then I can see three possible problem areas:
1) Training and familiarity with the civilian radio channel usage and/or equipment.
2) Improper programming of those frequencies and/or equipment.
3) Reliable radio coverage of the XSD North Command system within the confines of the Marine base.
All-in-all, it was interesting to hear after all of the chaos from the major recent fires. It seemed like a good effort on the part of Camp Pendleton to accommodate the outside agencies but with definite (to me based on what I heard) issues that still need ironing out.
-Mike
Firstly, Camp Pendleton Fire announced it on VFIRE 21 (154.280MHz with a CTCSS of 156.7Hz) and immediately did a role call to surrounding agencies for acknowledgement! They did state that they were not requesting any assistance a this time. Maybe they've been doing this for a while but it is the first time I have noticed it. The surrounding agencies who they polled included Orange County Fire, Monte Vista (CDF San Diego County), Cleveland National Forest, NORCOM (San Diego County North County Dispatch JPA), and Perris (CDF Riverside County). The only one who did not respond was Perris.
I found this interesting and, overall, a good practice. Given the recent multi-fire incidents in north county with some on Camp Pendleton spreading into the surrounding counties, I think it is wise for Camp Pendleton (who operates primarily on their own federal P25 trunked system within the base and much of that voice traffic is encrypted, even the fire traffic) to use a nationally designated civilian VHF frequency to keep the outside agencies informed and to then poll those agencies for acknowledgment! Interestingly, they then began working the fire using a San Diego County controlled civilian frequency for command (XSD North Command) and a VFIRE frequency for tactical (VFIRE 22). I couldn't hear the tactical simplex traffic but could easily hear the XSD North Command repeater.
Now the bad - at least from my listening it appears that Camp Pendleton Fire, at least, needs to work on their VHF civilian radio channel programming and/or procedures. They repeatedly had problems communicating with the units in the field on the XSD North Command channel. The thing is - as far as I could tell, I heard all of the units calling each other but they didn't seem to hear each other much of the time. Primarily, it was "Pendleton Fire" trying to talk to the IC on scene. The on-scene unit apparently switched input tones and finally could get through but even after that it was very sporadic. I have that frequency in carrier squelch mode with CTCSS search activated. I noticed that frequently (but not always) the base ("Pendleton Fire") would transmit with a tone on the repeater output while the field unit never did. I am guessing that the system is set up like the CDF and USFS systems such that a different repeater could be activated by using the correct tone on the input. However, I could not discern a noticeable change on the repeater signal level when they did this (but it could just be different remote receivers with one primary transmitter). At one point the field unit seemed to get pretty frustrated because of the problems. By the way, the problem seemed to work both ways - sometimes it was the field unit repeatedly calling and not getting a response from the base and sometimes it was the base repeatedly calling and not getting a response from the field unit. They wound up switching back to the trunked system repeatedly because they couldn't rely on the XSD North Command repeater(s). It sounded like they repeatedly kept trying to return back to XSD North Command but it remained sporadic in terms of effectiveness.
I don't monitor the Camp Pendleton UHF trunked system much these days because it is a true P25 system and they use a lot of encryption, even on the fire talk groups. In many cases, some users are clear but the folks they are talking to are encrypted (of course the user radios are programmed to decrypt any encrypted traffic as well as pass any clear traffic so it's all transparent to the users). For me, this makes listening to this system difficult and annoying because my only P25 capable scanners are GRE types which do not mute encrypted traffic on full P25 systems (they will on mixed mode older systems like the County RCS but not on true P25 systems like what Camp Pendleton uses) so I have to hear all of the encrypted garble in order to hear the occasional clear voice traffic. In this case, Pendleton Fire (base) was always encrypted while the field units were sometimes encrypted and sometimes not.
Anyway, I have some questions concerning the XSD North Command channel system for the folks-in-the-know (Don?):
1) How extensive a network is that system composed of in terms of multiple repeaters and/or remote bases, and/or remote receivers?
2) Is any of the network hardware located on the Marine base itself or is it all located outside of the base (I assume the main stuff is likely on Palomar Mountain)?
3) Is it going to remain such that the output frequency of the repeater(s) will be either without CTCSS or with various CTCSS tones or is there some future plan to put a common tone on the output with multi-tone access on the input as is now done on the CDF and USFS repeaters?
It sounded to me, during this small incident, that Pendleton Fire was "trying" to use XSD North Command as might have been dictated by a well meaning and theoretically logical plan but kept going back to their primarily "closed" base trunked system when they couldn't reliably or consistently use the XSD North Command repeater(s).
If there really were issues (again, all I can state is how it SEEMED to me from my listening), then I can see three possible problem areas:
1) Training and familiarity with the civilian radio channel usage and/or equipment.
2) Improper programming of those frequencies and/or equipment.
3) Reliable radio coverage of the XSD North Command system within the confines of the Marine base.
All-in-all, it was interesting to hear after all of the chaos from the major recent fires. It seemed like a good effort on the part of Camp Pendleton to accommodate the outside agencies but with definite (to me based on what I heard) issues that still need ironing out.
-Mike
Aucun commentaire:
Enregistrer un commentaire