OC Fire ....Strange Tac Channel?

[Robertolson]

A Vegetation Fire was dispatch This Morning out on The Ortega highway, The assigned Tac Channel was ...Command 1..... Tone 2... ????.... what Talk Group is That??......or is it a Local talk around Channel

 

[W6KRU]

That was probably Calfire(CDF) Cmd 1. It is a repeated VHF channel,

 

[Robertolson]

That makes sense as Riverside County, US Forest Service, and OC Fire can all Communicate Together

 

[monitor142]

OC Fire is using more VHF in the mutual threat zones. OCFA has VHF BK radios mobiles/portables in all their rigs now and other OC Fire agencies are adding them as VHF is the band used most for mutual aid for the fire service. I heard that some new CalFire Command Repeaters may be installed at select county radio sites to improve VHF repeater coverage in the wildland areas.

As more VHF infrastructure comes online, they can do patching to the 800 system as needed.

-M142

 

[Markb]

I believe that based on experiences over the last several years, they are actually trying to get away from patching altogether for major or potentially major wildland fires.
It becomes difficult to get everyone moved to VHF later in an incident when everyone is busy working and you are maybe not comfortable with your VHF equipment or whatever and the radio you use everyday works fine because it's patched.
You can't fault anyone in that situation, but it's tough when the "lowest common denominator" in the state is VHF. Even if you are patched to the VHF command channel and you need to get ahold of air attack or a helicopter for a drop and they are monitoring CDF Air to Ground, that Motorola isn't going to be much use. I'm not knocking OCFA at all, It's just the reality of the situation.

Mark

 

[K6CDO]

I believe that based on experiences over the last several years, they are actually trying to get away from patching altogether for major or potentially major wildland fires.
It becomes difficult to get everyone moved to VHF later in an incident when everyone is busy working and you are maybe not comfortable with your VHF equipment or whatever and the radio you use everyday works fine because it's patched.
You can't fault anyone in that situation, but it's tough when the "lowest common denominator" in the state is VHF. Even if you are patched to the VHF command channel and you need to get ahold of air attack or a helicopter for a drop and they are monitoring CDF Air to Ground, that Motorola isn't going to be much use. I'm not knocking OCFA at all, It's just the reality of the situation.

Mark

There has been a lot of work done in the last couple of years on establishing and defining "Mutual Threat Zones" (MTZs) where multiple agencies (dispatched by different comm centers, on disparate radio systems and/or bands) often end up being called for an incident. As MTZs are identified, boundaries are defined for CAD maps and initial attack communications plans (frequently on VHF) are agreed to for all responding agencies to use on initial dispatch.

San Diego County agencies have been working on this for about 18 months, starting in the north part of the county (Camp Pendleton interface with Orange County, the USFS, and North County JPA agencies; Escondido, San Diego and CalFIRE in San Pasqual Valley as a couple of examples).

I believe that there may be similar planning efforts underway for the various Ventura / L.A. City / L.A. County interface points.

Don