Cal Fire in San Fernando Valley

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KMA367

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Does anyone know what Freq's for Cal Fire i would need for the SFV? Mainly Air Ops...or LAFD air ops?
Cal-Fire has no fire protection responsibilities in the San Fernando Valley, or anywhere in L.A. County. Los Angeles is one of six counties (also Kern, Marin, Orange, Santa Barbara and Ventura) who have contracted with the state to provide wildland fire protection on state responsibility areas (SRA) within the county, which is handled by LA County Fire Department.

Most of the SFV is under LA City FD's jurisdiction, and LAFD air operations will be found the 800-band frequencies assigned to an incident, see Los Angeles Regional Fire/Rescue Communications Center and/or on their normal VHF Air Ops frequency of 119.975.

For a vegetation fire of any size, it's common for other agencies, especially LACoFD, to provide mutual aid, in which case the frequencies will start changing and you'll have to listen for the Comm Plans as they evolve. LA County Fire operates on UHF and VHF, see the first agency listed on Los Angeles County, California (CA) Scanner Frequencies and Radio Frequency Reference . Both departments' aircraft can access just about any frequency in life.

Since your focus seemed to be on the LAFD's area, referring again to their frequency list, initial fire and EMS dispatches in the valley normally go out on Channel 8, 858.4375. In general, the first Valley incident needing a tac frequency will get Channel 17 if it's available, followed by Ch 18 if it's available. If they need more than that, the firefighter/dispatchers at OCD will start at Tac 13 and move down the list until they find enough available channels. The 800-band system is analog, not trunked, so just needs to be programmed in normally, in FM mode.
 
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MCIAD

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Arriving somewhere, but not here . . .
Just to add to what KMA367 stated above, The Ventura County FPD, LACoFD, and LFD have an agreement that states for vegetation fires in the "triangle" where all three agencies come together, mainly in the Rocky Peak/Topanga Canyon area, the default Air-to-Ground frequency will be LACoFD Tac-19, which is 154.4000. Any initial attack brush fires involving those three agencies should be on Tac-19 for Helco Ops also.

For the record, VNC air-to-ground is 154.235 and CalFire's is 151.220[N].
 
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