Arch Medical Helcpters

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VASCAR2

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In reference to ARCH helicopters there is also an ARCH helicopter based in Effingham Illinois and in Southeastern Illinois ARCH and Air Evac cover some of the same territory. There is also an Air Evac helicopter stationed near Effingham, one at Mt Vernon Il airport and one at Deaconess Hospital in Evansville Indiana.

There is also St Mary's life flight based in Evansville Indiana which responds into southern Illinois and Western Ky. I was at a crash a few years ago and had an Air Evac helicopter dispatched from Cape Girardeau Mo because all other Air Evac helicopters were on incidents including St Mary's Life flight. With air speeds near 150 MPH flying a direct course its amazing how fast a EMS helicopter can respond to a scene even 100 miles away.

The Illinois State Police generally do not have frequency 154.430 or other fire frequency unless it is programmed into the individual troopers High Band car radio. Since ISP has migrated to StarCom 21 most Troopers don't have VHF high band portables. The ISP districts can patch the troopers 800 SC portable to IREACH (155.055) or ISPERN (155.475) so the Trooper could talk to an EMS helicopter responding to a scene. This patch has been utilized but typically the local EMS or Fire Dept. do most communications with the EMS helicopter depending on who was the requesting agency to the helicopter.
 

wb0wao

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Also, it should be noted that both ARCH and AirEvac helos have "frequency agile" radios - a fancy phrase for front-programmable-radios. I have heard dispatch advise them on many occasions to contact EMS on a specific frequency/tone combination. Simply put, they can show up on pretty much any simplex VHF channel.
 

n5ims

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Pl = Private line or CTCSS

whats that

It's a way to restrict what is heard on a radio to only stations that transmit that specific very low frequency tone on their transmissions. For example, your radio is on say 154.98 MHz and using a PL of 118.8. A nearby transmission is made by another user on 154.98 MHz that you would normally be able to hear, but they have their radio set to use a PL of 103.5. You will not hear their transmission, nor will that other user hear yours since the PL tone doesn't match. If somebody else had a scanner close by tuned to 154.98 MHz and had their radio set for CSQ (basically set to ignore the PL tone), they'd hear both transmissions.

The RR WIKI article on this is here --> Continuous Tone-Coded Squelch System - The RadioReference Wiki
 

990adv

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Has there been some sort of buy out or a restructurung of the company?

I ask this due to the following information I heard. Currently at my hospital we have Carle hospital employees as members of Airlife. This is to change in the future. We will still have a helicopter crew stationed at Carle but they will not be Carle employees.I do not know if the current crew will just transition to another company or how this is working. Interesting.

I will try to find out more.
 

VASCAR2

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Also, it should be noted that both ARCH and AirEvac helos have "frequency agile" radios - a fancy phrase for front-programmable-radios. I have heard dispatch advise them on many occasions to contact EMS on a specific frequency/tone combination. Simply put, they can show up on pretty much any simplex VHF channel.

Your correct about the helicopters having ability to dial in a frequency at least in VHF High Band. I believe since a lot of tele communicators (dispatchers) are not always knowledgeable about radios other than knowing a frequency by name and don't understand about tone coded squelch/private line/channel guard its more user friendly to advised the helicopter to contact ground units on IREACH or MERCI.

If you advised most police officers to go to a simplex channel on their 800 Starcom radio they would be completely at a loss and wouldn't have a clue what you were talking about. With the trunked system the radio has to recognized by the site controller. I'm not aware of any air medical helicopters having radios set to work on any SC 21 talk groups.

At one time Illinois State Police Districts could communicate directly with ambulances based in Illinois. The ISP post monitored 155.340 with an assigned tone coded squelch and the ambulances had a scan head Motorola Micro radio which could receive ISP HF 4 (155.460) which is a state wide ISP frequency.

With the advent of programmable two way radios with the capability to transmit and receive 50 or more channels the need for the patch to ISP is not now utilized as often. The old crystal for every channel radios limited the number of frequencies a two way radio could operate to 4 or less. When I worked for a funeral home ambulance back in the late 1970's they had no direct radio contact with the local police or sheriff. I believe the state provided the MERCI radio in the ambulance and it only had the hospital (MERCI 155.340) frequency and the receiver for ISP HF 4. To contact the ISP you pushed the channel selector for ISP which changed the priority scan to the HF 4 receiver. You were actually cross talking between channels but the system worked.
 
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cifn2

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In reference to ARCH helicopters there is also an ARCH helicopter based in Effingham Illinois and in Southeastern Illinois ARCH and Air Evac cover some of the same territory. There is also an Air Evac helicopter stationed near Effingham, one at Mt Vernon Il airport and one at Deaconess Hospital in Evansville Indiana.

There is also St Mary's life flight based in Evansville Indiana which responds into southern Illinois and Western Ky. I was at a crash a few years ago and had an Air Evac helicopter dispatched from Cape Girardeau Mo because all other Air Evac helicopters were on incidents including St Mary's Life flight. With air speeds near 150 MPH flying a direct course its amazing how fast a EMS helicopter can respond to a scene even 100 miles away.

The Illinois State Police generally do not have frequency 154.430 or other fire frequency unless it is programmed into the individual troopers High Band car radio. Since ISP has migrated to StarCom 21 most Troopers don't have VHF high band portables. The ISP districts can patch the troopers 800 SC portable to IREACH (155.055) or ISPERN (155.475) so the Trooper could talk to an EMS helicopter responding to a scene. This patch has been utilized but typically the local EMS or Fire Dept. do most communications with the EMS helicopter depending on who was the requesting agency to the helicopter.


St Mary's Lifeflight I believe is an Air Methods helicopter which is part of the ARCH Family.
 

cifn2

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Pro-197 might be better discussed in a forum about the scanner and not as a thread stealing topic where it might get more discussion and response/assistance.
 

gewecke

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Pro-197 might be better discussed in a forum about the scanner and not as a thread stealing topic where it might get more discussion and response/assistance.

True. I stray sometimes. :lol:

73,
n9zas
 

Starcom21

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Shortbus91 needs help learning about scanning

We have to remember that shortbus91 started this thread... he is a Premium Subscriber that needs help learning about scanning and using the forums and wiki on RadioReference.com.

If you don't have a computer program for programming your scanner, you need to get one.
It is the easiest way to program and help understand.

Other things can be learned online by searching "Google" for what you need to try to find out.

This is probably a problem for many people and then they get scared into not asking for help and end up leaving the hobby all together.

Any ideas on how to help newbies? Any links???
 
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gewecke

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thanks starcom21 also whats the best way to find new frequnices

The database at the top of the page will take you where you want. Click on state and county and you're there! :)

73,
n9zas
 
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