Denver Fire "Tone"

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ch40n1k

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If I remember correctly, when Denver was VHF, they used a tone similar to that. I'm pretty sure. It's been a long time though, so the AARP members on this board may have more info than I do. ;)
 
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N0GTG

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Denver FD had a tone for alerting stations on the Vocalarm, but it was a single tone (the 'long ring'), possibly 1 kHz. I haven't heard it on VHF recently, though, for some reason. Anybody know what happened to that?

I've been listening to DFD for more years than I care to admit, and I've never heard two-tone sequential paging used on their dispatch (main dispatch used to be 154.31, fireground was the current 154.07). I believe they used to have some paging (as opposed to station alerting) on the fireground channel, which I believe was two-tone sequential.
 

ch40n1k

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N0GTG said:
Denver FD had a tone for alerting stations on the Vocalarm, but it was a single tone (the 'long ring'), possibly 1 kHz. I haven't heard it on VHF recently, though, for some reason. Anybody know what happened to that?

I've been listening to DFD for more years than I care to admit, and I've never heard two-tone sequential paging used on their dispatch (main dispatch used to be 154.31, fireground was the current 154.07). I believe they used to have some paging (as opposed to station alerting) on the fireground channel, which I believe was two-tone sequential.

I had no idea they still used VHF for anything. Learn something new every day.
 

n0doz

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Dudes, I think this is Denver MI, not Denver CO, since the other "tones" on his YouTube list are up there.
 

kc0kp

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Kurt was pretty much dead on. The dispatcher used an approximately 1000 hz tone that went through both the vocal alarm and the radio simultaneously. The dispatcher then announced the alarm over the vocal alarm only unless one of the rigs needed was on the air. Then re aired it on the radio.
A long "ring" , actually a tone, was used for structure fires, in Denver called a group. A short ring was used for single resource responses, called still alarms. When the tone went out on the radio, units in the field were to hold all unnecessary traffic until the dispatcher aired the call over the radio. Protocol dictated airing the call at least twice.
Lakewood used vocal alarms in that era (60s and 70s) and had much of the same nomenclature. They, however, called structure fires either a regular alarm or a commercial regular alarm if in a business. A still alarm was for resuscitations and private fire alarms.
 

utlchris

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Bancroft Fire used to have a real funky tone. Took about 15 seconds or so to go out. Wish I could find it somewhere but that was back in the day when wav files really didn't exist like they do these days. I believe Edgewater fire used the same tone since both agencies were dispatched by Jeffco.
 

ch40n1k

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utlchris said:
Bancroft Fire used to have a real funky tone. Took about 15 seconds or so to go out. Wish I could find it somewhere but that was back in the day when wav files really didn't exist like they do these days. I believe Edgewater fire used the same tone since both agencies were dispatched by Jeffco.

I remember those Bancroft tones! We used to live across the park from what I think is now WM station 10. We used to sit in the park and record the tones with a tape recorder (lol) over their PA when the weather was warm and their garage doors were open. (Strange kid, I know.)
 

ROOFLIFECO

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If you want to hear the tone that they use, program Denver Fire's VHF Simulcast frequency in your scanner. The freq. is 154.070. Unlike 800 edacs where you will hear them just repeat what they have already dispatched, you will actually hear the dispatch to the station on that frequency.

Hope that helps
 
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