SAFE-T 800MHz System Approaching Capacity Limits

[kb9sxk]

You mean 64000? This is the figure in ISPC's letter.
I too have attended the training sessions, and some of it is technically wrong. Grant money is tax dollars, spoken like a true government employee.

Yes, but from a much larger pool, much less impact on local citizens

Most of the Safe-T money comes from a fee (tax) on driver's licenses.
User fees charged by Michigan and Ohio are also a tax... but their systems are not at capacity because it is too expense to use for most agencies

.

The user fees are placed on the budgets of user departments. Michigan even charges by the minute.

ISPC tells us what they think we need and how we should do our job. And the emergency responders let them, and now we have a radio system that they are telling to not use because it's at capacity. Previous years they went around telling everybody this is the system switch to, this is the system that they brag about in national media. It is quickly becoming failure in my opinion.

Where the heck do you get this?

IPSC is making you do nothing. Some of us are begging them to make and enforce policy. No one has ever told a responder how to do your job.

No one at IPSC or IDHS has told anyone not to use the system. On the contrary, they are asking us to use it! "Use it or lose it so to speak"

No one is forcing communities to switch to it. Failure? Well you are entitled to an opinion, but please donr post opinions as fact.

 

[jerk]

Failure... yes, they are out of room for radios... how is anyone from other states and to Fed's use the system... it can't handle what we have now.

The two large incident they talk about as success stories on their web site were tornadoes years ago. This system has not been tested, Trust me it will FAIL. the number of busies is excessive for normal use. This means the capacity is not there. A look at any other state systems and what happened in a large scale disaster tells the wise among us this fact.

INDOT almost brought down the system this year and last with plow truck chit-chat.That is inexcusable.

The next large disaster the system will, not maybe, will collapse in chaos. That is if it remains operational. There is one main site near me that is unaccessible in a heavy snow. A tornado will also block access, a wind storm took down trees which required two days to open access to the site which thankfully remained unaffected.

But the number of busies being experienced is a failure.
The lack of available radio ID's is a failure.

 

[aaron315]

A thought to free up nearly 5K radio IDs: Remove Safe-T from the MECA radios. Program national interop conventional analog and digital channels, and then train the users to use the equipment.

Second thought: How many EMA agencies have "cache" radios on the system that are never used. Again, program them with the conventional national interop channels and remove them from the trunked system. Lord that is hundreds if not thousands of IDs more.

And remind me again why INDOT is on the system? At least two radio ID's and one RF channel for every flagging operation? Ummm, oh boy.

Just my two cents.

The whole thing smells like planned obsolescence.

Most of the central Indiana sites are overloaded already anyway. Bonk Bonk Bonk Bonk busy busy busy.....

 

[kb9sxk]

You guys....dont use it then. Dont scan it then. It is a success in my professional eyes.

 

[Jay34]

It makes me wonder Y they went to a system that they know would fail the minute there is a major crisis in the state of Indiana. There should of been no reason at all to switch to a costly system such as SAFE-T, when they already ILEEN, which can be used by multiple agencies in the time of a disaster. Y is INDOT even on the system? They dont need it!
Michigan has the same kind of 800 mhz system for every single fire,ems,police,etc in the entire damn state. Even the MDOT is under that system!

ITS A WASTE OF TAXPAYERS MONEY TO BE ON SUCH AN EXPENSIVE SYSTEM WHEN THERE WAS NO NEED TO EVEN REPLACE IT!

 

[kb9sxk]

Jay,

How will this system fail?

What do they know?

I give up. SAFE-T is a gift and a tool that I am happy to have availible

 

[KidClerk]

Nope. I was handed these radios and was never given any chance to offer my input as to how they should be programmed.

No 8CALL or 8TAC?

 

[AK9R]

Kyle, I think this brings up a possible issue with the way SAFE-T has been rolled out to the users.

Does anybody know if IPSC provides any guidance as to how these radios should be programmed? Does that guidance stipulate that every radio, at a minimum, be programmed with the statewide and regional mutual aid talkgroups and the NPSPAC channels? If the idea is to promote interoperability, those talkgroups and channels should be a requirement in every SAFE-T radio.

 

[frankcastle]

Kyle, I think this brings up a possible issue with the way SAFE-T has been rolled out to the users.

Does anybody know if IPSC provides any guidance as to how these radios should be programmed? Does that guidance stipulate that every radio, at a minimum, be programmed with the statewide and regional mutual aid talkgroups and the NPSPAC channels? If the idea is to promote interoperability, those talkgroups and channels should be a requirement in every SAFE-T radio.

Marshall County radios have all of our regional and all the statewide mutual aid channels as well as all NPSPAC channels. We were told that they have to have that on our template. We must also have B-MA1 in the scan list.

 

[kb9sxk]

Kyle, I think this brings up a possible issue with the way SAFE-T has been rolled out to the users.

Does anybody know if IPSC provides any guidance as to how these radios should be programmed? Does that guidance stipulate that every radio, at a minimum, be programmed with the statewide and regional mutual aid talkgroups and the NPSPAC channels? If the idea is to promote interoperability, those talkgroups and channels should be a requirement in every SAFE-T radio.

And they are supposed to be in every radio

http://www.in.gov/ipsc/files/Interoperability_talkgroups_4.doc

http://www.in.gov/ipsc/files/Regional_and_Statewide_Interoperability_Talkgroups.doc

http://www.in.gov/ipsc/files/Legacy_Subscriber_Policy_IPSC.doc

 

[frankcastle]

And they are supposed to be in every radio

http://www.in.gov/ipsc/files/Interoperability_talkgroups_4.doc

http://www.in.gov/ipsc/files/Regional_and_Statewide_Interoperability_Talkgroups.doc

http://www.in.gov/ipsc/files/Legacy_Subscriber_Policy_IPSC.doc

I guess ERS was correct, in the way they set up our radios.

 

[KLH]

It looks like our county (Knox) was not programmed right.
The volunteer fire dept does NOT have the regional mutual aid channels ( O-MA1 - 3) programmed into their radios. I am unsure about the SW-MA channels.

A few weeks ago a volunteer fire dept needed mutual aid from Sullivan county. Do to the way their radios were programmed for SAFET, a local TG was being used (TAC 2 I believe) and also O-MA-3 and H-MA ? and who knows what TG Sullivan co was also using for the run.
The fire dept did not have O-MA programmed into the radios, so they had to stay on the local TAC 2 channel and central dispatch had to patch all these TGs together just so Fire/EMS/Police could communicate (they had to do evacuations and block roads, etc.).

 

[kb9sxk]

It looks like our county (Knox) was not programmed right.
The volunteer fire dept does NOT have the regional mutual aid channels ( O-MA1 - 3) programmed into their radios. I am unsure about the SW-MA channels.

A few weeks ago a volunteer fire dept needed mutual aid from Sullivan county. Do to the way their radios were programmed for SAFET, a local TG was being used (TAC 2 I believe) and also O-MA-3 and H-MA ? and who knows what TG Sullivan co was also using for the run.
The fire dept did not have O-MA programmed into the radios, so they had to stay on the local TAC 2 channel and central dispatch had to patch all these TGs together just so Fire/EMS/Police could communicate (they had to do evacuations and block roads, etc.).

Let John Streeter know this please.

 

[KidClerk]

Our radios (only have two of them) have the A and D region mutual aid talkgroups as well as our county PD, and fire and the OPS talkgroups, but no NPSPAC. Our sheriff's dept. has such spotty coverage, they rarely use them on a regular basis, and none of our fire departments utilize them as their priority system. The only time I use the portable I have on my desk here at home is during severe weather to talk to my EMA director and not tie up the dispatch repeater. From a fire department standpoint where you are using portable VHF radios on our firefighter's air packs, it makes more sense to just have all communications on VHF rather than have to carry two radios around. I can lose/drop/break 8 CP200 radios to one XTS2500. Don't get me wrong, I can see some benefits to the SAFE-T system in a larger scenario, if you have a command center manned, but in the other 99% of scenarios we encounter, common sense says to stay on VHF.

Kyle, I think this brings up a possible issue with the way SAFE-T has been rolled out to the users.

Does anybody know if IPSC provides any guidance as to how these radios should be programmed? Does that guidance stipulate that every radio, at a minimum, be programmed with the statewide and regional mutual aid talkgroups and the NPSPAC channels? If the idea is to promote interoperability, those talkgroups and channels should be a requirement in every SAFE-T radio.

 

[KidClerk]

I didn't read anything in there that required these to be programmed in every radio. The word 'should' and not 'shall' was used. The only requirement was that the manufacturers be required to make their equipment compatible, but, unless I missed it, no requirement to program them. It's really a moot point, as we don't have enough radios to make it effective for use nor do we use the ones we have.

And they are supposed to be in every radio

http://www.in.gov/ipsc/files/Interoperability_talkgroups_4.doc

http://www.in.gov/ipsc/files/Regional_and_Statewide_Interoperability_Talkgroups.doc

http://www.in.gov/ipsc/files/Legacy_Subscriber_Policy_IPSC.doc

 

[kb9sxk]

I didn't read anything in there that required these to be programmed in every radio. The word 'should' and not 'shall' was used. The only requirement was that the manufacturers be required to make their equipment compatible, but, unless I missed it, no requirement to program them. It's really a moot point, as we don't have enough radios to make it effective for use nor do we use the ones we have.

That was my point earlier. many of us are working to get them to firm up some of these suggestions and use the word shall a bit more.

If the level of use in your county works for your county then awesome! This system is just one more tool for you.

 

[KidClerk]

The level of use works because the system doesn't! Spotty coverage and few radios. Started using it last night when we had tornadoes to our west but switched to VHF as more departments came out to do storm spotting.

That was my point earlier. many of us are working to get them to firm up some of these suggestions and use the word shall a bit more.

If the level of use in your county works for your county then awesome! This system is just one more tool for you.

 

[WA9JGB]

Kyle, I think this brings up a possible issue with the way SAFE-T has been rolled out to the users.

Does anybody know if IPSC provides any guidance as to how these radios should be programmed? Does that guidance stipulate that every radio, at a minimum, be programmed with the statewide and regional mutual aid talkgroups and the NPSPAC channels? If the idea is to promote interoperability, those talkgroups and channels should be a requirement in every SAFE-T radio.

Bob, Yes they do. ALL Regional and SW tg's including simplex is to be programed into EVERY radio, HOWEVER they do NOT police that.

 

[powerlineman]

It looks like our county (Knox) was not programmed right.
The volunteer fire dept does NOT have the regional mutual aid channels ( O-MA1 - 3) programmed into their radios. I am unsure about the SW-MA channels.

A few weeks ago a volunteer fire dept needed mutual aid from Sullivan county. Do to the way their radios were programmed for SAFET, a local TG was being used (TAC 2 I believe) and also O-MA-3 and H-MA ? and who knows what TG Sullivan co was also using for the run.
The fire dept did not have O-MA programmed into the radios, so they had to stay on the local TAC 2 channel and central dispatch had to patch all these TGs together just so Fire/EMS/Police could communicate (they had to do evacuations and block roads, etc.).

We communicate with Knox Co on mutual aid runs on O-MA 2 regularly with Harrsion Twp. We use SW-MA during the Lawrenceville water shuttle op's/flood in 2008

 

[powerlineman]

And after all is said and done, I still can't communicate with my counterparts 10 miles to the west of me in Illinois. Oh, wait, sure I can....on VHF.

Lawrence Allison Fire Dept, Lawrenceville Illinois has a Safe-T handheld held in a converta-com in every apparatus....and a Safe-T control station in their fire house.....good for Knox Co. IN...bad for the rest of Indiana if you want a radio ID.
Not sure why they do this because Knox has a fancy console with patching capabilities.....which was the excuse for the expensive console...that way they can patch to their illegal non licensed VHF base radios

Another waste of ID's are running jail ops on Safe-T....
Or leaving the county Hi-Way patched to Safe-T for days at a time...
The rules are different in Knox Co.....With Rick L and Montana Mike..