New type of radio system?

[njt462]

I have been monitoring Lincoln County Sheriff, Fire, EMS, and City PDs since 1999, and back in 2005 I noticed something new on only the Sheriff's Channels. Before a unit transmit over the scanner you will hear a 3 digit number dailed on a phone then what they say. When the Dispatcher speaks it goes through like normal. After a few months I was able to figure out the dial thing is 9-1-1.

Yesterday I was at the Denny's in town eatting, and there were two Lincoln County Sheriffs inside eatting. When i exited my car and began to walk in one left their radio on in their car and the window down and I was hearing a seven digit phone number followed by 9-1-1 then the transmission.

Inside the Denny's the two sheriffs had their hand-helds on and they were going nuts everytime one unit spoke or dispatch it would go some type of seven digit phone number followed by 9-1-1 then what they are saying. And a few time it would go seven digit number 9-1-1 seven more digits.

One sheriff left before the other one and I could see from my seat out the window he keyed his car radio mic to announce he was 10-8, but by the time the other sheriff's radio got done dialing a long distance phone call (lol) to hear the 10-8 transmission the sheriff already had his headlights on and car starting to move so everythinig is on a delay.

I asked the other sheriff what is up with the radios doesn't that drive you nuts hearing all that. The Sheriff replied " It is stupid I don't understand the meaning behind it, and when I go home after 12 hours I still hear phones dialing for a good hour." lol


So I was wanting to know has anyone ever monitored a department like that, what is it? I monitor alot of departments and this is the only one that is like this.

And also how come on my scanner and all the other people in my scanning group we only hear 9-1-1 follow by the transmission and not all those 7 digit numbers?

I do know this much their radios are not a digital system, because we all have anolog scanners. The only thing I can think is that the department has all systems in place for digital just is not using it, or they are all ready to go fully encripited but just have it unprotected for the time being.

Lets hear the ideas or facts fellow members.

Thanks in advance for the help or information.

 

[jim202]

Sounds like someone had a brain fart and conned the system owner into putting in a
poor form of ANI. This is a system where there is a short burst of data or digits at
the begining of a transmission to identify the keyed up radio. If implimented wrong
and more than a couple of digits are used, it will drive people nuts. You are seeing
the results.

Back at the dispatch operations, there should be a box that decodes these digits and
displays the number of the radio that is sending.

Jim

 

[mjthomas59]

They aren't the only system i've heard like that, however i haven't to date heard more than 3 or 4 digits comeover before any transmission. Not that i monitor lincoln county everyday but when i have it is always limited to 3 or 4 digits.

Lincoln county does have a pretty massive system(no clue why) with all kinds of RF links in the UHF range. That whole system seems like a joke to me, lincoln county is a pretty large county in terms of size(not population), but i still don't understand how you need to have a dozen RF links and towers setup every 20 miles. Just seems like a waste. The Patrol can cover more area than that with half the towers.

 

[njt462]

When this first started it was back in 2005 when they launched their towers to have zero dead spots, because before there were many dead spots. But like you said I think they went over board on it.

 

[njt462]

I think you might be right about it being some type of caller id set up on the dispatchers end because in reference to an earlier post I made about the Sheriff channel being hijacked it was from a stolen firefighters radio which did not do the digit dialing expect now the fire district that had the radio stolen is the only fire district in the county with the digit dialing. But if it is a caller id system I wonder why in the world it took them over six months to catch the sucker that is illegaling transmitting.

But my main questions are why are the scanning only hearing the 9-1-1 tone and then the transmission, and why instead are the real things hearing a long distance phone number dialing? And lastly, why is everything being delayed on the radio traffic because of this, couldnt this really cut down on response times and could hurt lifes being delayed like this?

 

[clayman]

I hear MoDot using DTMF (phone numbers) in KC, I assume to select or open a particular repeater. The DTMF signaling is maybe being used to select a tower or as an access code, although 7 digits is rather long. If you have the tone squelch turned on, on your scanner, it's possible the 7 digits don't come through with a tone. Sounds like a strange implementation of a radio system.
Clayton