Cleveland National Forest New Forest Net

Teotwaki

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Hey, I've gotta ask, why is this thread in the LA/Inland Area forum? The Trabuco Ranger District is split between Orange, Riverside and a little bit of San Diego Counties. The remaining Ranger Districts are in San Diego County, with a handful of square miles in Riverside on the Palomar District and the the largest district, the Alpine RD in SD Co.


Historically the thread was probably accidentallt started here by the OP. Earlier in the thread I was being , um, "pushed" by a (now gone "QRT") admin/moderator for posting about CNF. I tried to create a new thread for CNF and the cranky admin at the time deleted my other thread and declared he was now opposed to what I was posting:. "We don't need a new thread. This thread can be used to discuss CNF, I don't see a problem with that, the issue was your posts of who's checking in when and where. That information can be added to the wiki"

Anyhow, he is gone from the forum and I am still posting what I hear in this thread. I suppose it could be moved but I don't care one way or the other.

Jim.
 

Teotwaki

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Thanks for the WildWeb PDF conversion. I don't know how to do such a conversion, but now know that it can be done some I'm going to fiddle with it a bit.

I highlight and copy the columns on the WildWeb pages, post it into Excel, delete the status column, then use Excel's PDF conversion function.

Jim
 

Paysonscanner

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I highlight and copy the columns on the WildWeb pages, post it into Excel, delete the status column, then use Excel's PDF conversion function.

Jim

Many thanks. The computer skills in our household are below average. My late Hubby's were excellent and I suppose that is why I've never developed the skills I would like to have.
 

Teotwaki

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Strong simplex on Tac 4 discussing numerous cars, people driving all the way from West Covina.
 

Paysonscanner

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Strong simplex on Tac 4 discussing numerous cars, people driving all the way from West Covina.

My late Hubby had family in southern California so we kept track of the USFS, USFWS, NPS, CDF, CDFW, CA DPR down there for when we visited. I just pulled up a an old San Diego County file he loaded into our PSR 500/600's. The file is dated December 2015 so I don't know if it is current. He shows the 3 R5 tacticals being assigned on the Cleveland as T4 166.5500 assigned to the Palomar Ranger District. Tac 5, 167.1125 assigned to the Trabuco RD and Tac 6 168.2375 assigned to the Descanso RD. If this is current you are picking up Palomar RD simplex traffic, which a maximum 5 watts on their handhelds is pretty good. I would not be surprised to hear you pick up traffic on the Trabuco RD, given Santiago Peak hanging over Orange Co., so you must be picking up people high on Palomar or might even be hearing some people going to or coming back from training.

Late Hubby's notebooks have a 2016 Angeles NF channel/group listing. They only show use of the NIFC Tacs 1-3 in them, not the R5 tacs. Daddy says that there is national direction that all NIFC tacs are to only be used on Type I and Type II incidents, not for local tactical use on Type III - V incidents. So agencies are supposed to pull the NIFC tacs out of their primary channel groups. That is why several regions or GACC areas have come up with "Regional Tacs" such as R5, but in 2016 the Angeles wasn't doing this. Maybe they finally did and you are hearing Angeles units. The San Bernardino 2018 channel/group program has the regional tacs in it, but still have many groups with 168.2000 still in their primary groups. I guess then you could also be hearing SBNF or "BDF" units also. I don't remember where West Covina is so I don't know. It's all a big megalopolis to me.
 

zerg901

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Teotwaki - the RRDB shows 171.1375R as "Admin" and it shows 171.425R as "Forest Net". Would a fair translation be that the fire units operate on 171.425R and everyone else operates on 171.1375R?
 

Teotwaki

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Teotwaki - the RRDB shows 171.1375R as "Admin" and it shows 171.425R as "Forest Net". Would a fair translation be that the fire units operate on 171.425R and everyone else operates on 171.1375R?

Sorry for the delay in answering. I've not looked at tracking the usage of the two channels as per your question so someone else may have a good observation to share but you may well be correct. I did some searching on USFS repeater usage and it appears implementing two channels in the same manner as CNF is not a common practice in Region 5. For instance, Inyo does not appear to have Admin or Forest channels designated


Lassen has an Admin net but no Forest net

Angeles and San Bernardino do have both Admin and Forest net channels in the lineup and I believe the same radio techs service the radio systems of all three SoCal Forests.

 

Paysonscanner

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Sorry for the delay in answering. I've not looked at tracking the usage of the two channels as per your question so someone else may have a good observation to share but you may well be correct. I did some searching on USFS repeater usage and it appears implementing two channels in the same manner as CNF is not a common practice in Region 5. For instance, Inyo does not appear to have Admin or Forest channels designated


Lassen has an Admin net but no Forest net

Angeles and San Bernardino do have both Admin and Forest net channels in the lineup and I believe the same radio techs service the radio systems of all three SoCal Forests.


Actually, every forest in California has an admin and a forest net, the Inyo being the only exception. The 2020 frequency guide I have shows the Lassen with both fire and admin. Both the Klamath and the Shasta-T have district or management area nets, the Shasta has 4 (all simplex with a remote base on each management unit) and the Klamath has 5, each with multiple repeaters. The Inyo has a north and a south net, which started out as a forest and admin net, but that forest is over 200 miles long so they found it necessary to break up the forest geographically. I guess being in dispatch was tough with only one net, traffic down by Mt. Whitney and the Kern Plateau getting covered by all the Mammoth traffic. I think that forest would have an admin net also, if they could afford it. They could also use a separate backcountry net. They already have a separate tactical for the backcountry, but some repeaters would help. The Inyo also has the BLM net, which is available as a command as the BLM people use the Inyo's system nearly all the time anyway. The Lake Tahoe Basin, the Klamath, the Cleveland and the San Bernardino don't show a service net in the guide, I remember when the San Berdo, the Angeles and the Cleveland all shared one. The Sequoia NF has 3 nets and a service net. Up in R6 (OR/WA) there are a lot of forests that have a net for each ranger district, some have 1-2 districts on a net for a total of 3 or more on each forest. There is a little of that up in Region 1 as well.
 

Teotwaki

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I'm hearing lots of firefighter simplex chatter on these frequencies

163.7125
168.6125
166.5500
 

Teotwaki

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Actually, every forest in California has an admin and a forest net, the Inyo being the only exception. The 2020 frequency guide I have shows the Lassen with both fire and admin. Both the Klamath and the Shasta-T have district or management area nets, the Shasta has 4 (all simplex with a remote base on each management unit) and the Klamath has 5, each with multiple repeaters. The Inyo has a north and a south net, which started out as a forest and admin net, but that forest is over 200 miles long so they found it necessary to break up the forest geographically. I guess being in dispatch was tough with only one net, traffic down by Mt. Whitney and the Kern Plateau getting covered by all the Mammoth traffic. I think that forest would have an admin net also, if they could afford it. They could also use a separate backcountry net. They already have a separate tactical for the backcountry, but some repeaters would help. The Inyo also has the BLM net, which is available as a command as the BLM people use the Inyo's system nearly all the time anyway. The Lake Tahoe Basin, the Klamath, the Cleveland and the San Bernardino don't show a service net in the guide, I remember when the San Berdo, the Angeles and the Cleveland all shared one. The Sequoia NF has 3 nets and a service net. Up in R6 (OR/WA) there are a lot of forests that have a net for each ranger district, some have 1-2 districts on a net for a total of 3 or more on each forest. There is a little of that up in Region 1 as well.


Wait a sec, but I think in a roundabout way you actually agreed with me that very few R5 Forests have currently implemented Forest and Admin nets.. You start by saying they all have Admin and Forest nets but then you list that the following do not -

Lassen with both fire and admin but not currently implemented Admin & Forest Nets
Klamath has district or management area net but not currently implemented Admin & Forest Nets
Shasta-T has district or management area net but not currently implemented Admin & Forest Nets
Inyo has a north and a south net but does have not currently implemented Admin & Forest Nets
I'm not sure how to interpret the rest of what you wrote but it does not seem those forests have currently implemented Admin & Forest Nets either.
 

bb911

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I'm hearing lots of firefighter simplex chatter on these frequencies

163.7125
168.6125
166.5500

The following “Common Use” frequencies are approved for Interagency Hot Shot Crew use for travel and incident intra-crew communications:
• 163.7125 MHz (Intra-Crew 1)
• 167.1375 MHz (Intra-Crew 2)
• 168.6125 MHz (Intra-Crew 3)
• 173.6250 MHz (Intra-Crew 4)
Interagency Hotshot Crew Intra-Crew Communications (2019-2)

166.5500 R5 Tac 4
 

Paysonscanner

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Wait a sec, but I think in a roundabout way you actually agreed with me that very few R5 Forests have currently implemented Forest and Admin nets.. You start by saying they all have Admin and Forest nets but then you list that the following do not -

Lassen with both fire and admin but not currently implemented Admin & Forest Nets
Klamath has district or management area net but not currently implemented Admin & Forest Nets
Shasta-T has district or management area net but not currently implemented Admin & Forest Nets
Inyo has a north and a south net but does have not currently implemented Admin & Forest Nets
I'm not sure how to interpret the rest of what you wrote but it does not seem those forests have currently implemented Admin & Forest Nets either.

The Lassen, Modoc and the Sierra call what most forests would call "Forest Net," but chooses to call it "Fire Net." On many forests everyone but fire management uses admin net, with fire using forest net. The Shasta-T and Klamath have what are essentially district nets, which is similar to having a forest or fire net for each district. The Inyo is the only forest without an admin net, but they still have two nets with all fire and admin on each. However, in the times we visited the Inyo, they do make quite a bit of use of their Service Net and the BLM Field Office net as alternatives. Their options are not total though, as both of those nets have fewer repeaters than the two forest nets.

There are 17 national forests and the Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit in Region 5, for a total of 18 Forest Supervisors. 9 of them have a forest and admin net. The Lassen, the Mendocino, and the Sierra call their 2 nets something different, but still have 2 nets. The Tahoe calls their nets "Forest" and "Fire." The Lake Tahoe Basin calls their nets "Basin" and "Admin." The Sequoia has 3 nets, "Emergency," "Fire" and "Admin." In these exceptions there are still 2 nets, they just choose to label them differently. The Shasta-T and Klamath have district nets. The Inyo is the one exception as they divide their 2 nets geographically, but then that forest is about 200+ miles from north to south. I was commenting on the "it appears implementing two channels in the same manner as CNF is not common practice in Region 5" statement. As you can see every forest has at least 2 nets, what they call them varies in half of them, but the use is similar, with one using a geographical,instead of functional, designation.

It should be noted that the district nets on the Shasta-T and the admin net on the Sequoia are simplex with multiple remote bases. I also see that 10 of the forests have a service net listed in their primary channel groups.
 

Teotwaki

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The Lassen, Modoc and the Sierra call what most forests would call "Forest Net," but chooses to call it "Fire Net." ---snip

I've read this a few times and at best I can summarize it as: certain areas have radio channels which may function as admin or forest nets but can be named differently and the radio hardware may be implemented differently (remote base vs repeater).
 

Teotwaki

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There is a fire in CNF this morning in Silverado Canyon. From wildcad WCCA-CNF

CNF-3386​
MUTUAL AID/SILVERADO​
Wildfire​
SANTIAGO CANYON RD/SILVERADO CYN RD​
.​
BC21^ E320** E321** E322 E325^ E327^ H538 HT25M PT25 WT222^​

It is very windy so fixed wing aircraft cannot support fire suppression. Air 2 Air freq of 130.200 ("Rotor Victor") is very busy. They have established refueling at "El Toro". No ground frequency established for the refueling base but "5 Alpha" was mentioned.
 

zerg901

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"5 Alpha" might be on the Orange County 800 Mhz trunked radio system
 

jh73driver

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Anyone have the com plan for the Blue Ridge Fire in Yorba Linda? The usual Fire OC is being used for the Silverado Fire, so not sure what Blue Ridge is using.
Thanks in advance for the help!
 

Mikek

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Anyone have the com plan for the Blue Ridge Fire in Yorba Linda? The usual Fire OC is being used for the Silverado Fire, so not sure what Blue Ridge is using.
Thanks in advance for the help!
CDF Command 3 and VTACS 23-33.
 

norcalscan

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Blue Ridge air plan for extended attack:
Air Tactics 167.9125
A/G 159.2775 t192.8 (tac 25)
Rotor Vic 134.275

Silverado extended attack air freqs:
Air Tactics 169.2875
A/G 159.375 t192.8 (tac 20)
Rotor Vic 128.675
TOLC 123.025

Also Mendocino has an Admin and an Identity Crisis net. Some call it Fire Net, others still call it Forest net, depending on how stubborn their radio habit is. Proper name since the freq change is Fire Net. They also have 3 Law Net sites on the forest.
 
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Teotwaki

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I just heard Comms 27 checking in. This is a good time to listen for technical insights about the Cleveland repeater's configuration.
 

Teotwaki

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It seemed to be a busy day for the good Comms techs 22, 26, 27, 29. Initially Comms 27 was at the site of tone 12 (Elsinore Pk) and had it down for a while. I was away from the radio for a bit but just heard that 27 and three others had finished up their day at the Bear Valley Trailhead. If that's the one off of Highway 8 then I would guess they might have worked at Monument Peak which is the closest USFS radio site I can find.

Also for their repeater maintenance territories it seems that the assignments are

Comms 22 SBNF
Comms 26 ANF
Comms 27 CNF
Comms 29 CNF
 
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