Trip to Grand Forks

[ofd8001]

I'm planning a trip to Grand Forks next month.

Is there anything of interest or be mindful of as I get my scanners all set up for the trip?

(Did the typical database search/update).

I see where East Grand Forks PD may have converted to a P25 digital frequency. Is that in full operation?

I'm presuming Minnesota State Patrol has migrated to ARMER up that way.

Is the ND State Patrol encrypted or clear?

Previous trips that way saw little scanner traffic on state patrol (MN/ND), which I suppose is the norm for mostly rural areas. However I'm thinking with the ARMER system, I'm more likely to hear stuff for the 3200 district on the East Grand Forks tower, presuming a radio has affiliated with it.

 

[NDRADIONUT]

Im pretty sure egf is on the armer system as polk co is switched over to it... Any talkgroups you can id will be very welcome in the database... The reports from polk county have been pretty sparse... We have no fire tg's as of yet...

 

[ofd8001]

OK. I'll do some ID Searching and see what I come up with. Unfortunately my stay up there will be just a day or two

I'll let you know what I come up with.

 

[NDRADIONUT]

THANX !

 

[ofd8001]

Well I made it back and have some information to share. Probably should post this in Minnesota, but since we got this started here. . .

Good for scanner listening, but bad in other ways, there was both a tornado warning and SWAT situation while I was there. So with being in this area for less than 24 hours I have some nuggets of information to offer.

On ARMER, there appears to be a talkgroup, 49409 where law enforcement and the National Weather Service communicate warnings and other weather information (things observed). It was quite active during the tornado warnings.

East Grand Forks PD still is using their VHF frequency (digital). It is patched to that 51712 talkgroup. I heard comms on both VHF digital and on the ARMER talkgroup. However I did not see any Unit ID numbers on the scanner, so that's why I'm thinking the radios they have are VHF. During the SWAT situation, I'm presuming EGF sent officers into Grand Forks for assistance. The Minnesota State Patrol had a unit or two responding to EGF calls and were communicating directly with EGF PD dispatch ("540"). Polk SO appears to be using ARMER and I believe I did see Unit IDs, so they must be using 800 Mhz radios.

I doubt that EGF Fire has migrated to ARMER. I saw them responding to a call, but did not hear anything on the ARMER system to suggest they were using that. (I had a scanner in the hotel room recording everything and haven't reviewed all of the recordings yet. If anything changes, I'll let you know).

 

[NDRADIONUT]

10-4