Great scanning experience to share

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binaryecho

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So this holiday weekend I stayed with the in-laws in Laughlin, NV, which for thoes unaware is a small town on the Colorado River bordering NV and AZ and has 6 or 7 casinos in a row along the river. We were staying on the 14th floor with an awesome view of the river, all of the casinos, and most of the main roads. Armed with a decent set of binoculars and my BC246T, I loaded up all of the local frequencies to include the casinos, local law enforcement, river enforcement, AMR, parks, etc. for both the NV side and the Bullhead City emergency services across the river.

And it was one of the best scanning experiences I have ever had.

My excellent vantage point, paired with the fact that it was the 4th of July weekend was a perfect recipe for exciting radio comms.

And it delivered.

I spent most of the afternoon and evening with my laptop, scanner, and binos just watching everything unfold. It was very exciting to be able to hear a police call, start looking outside and be able to locate the situation. From boating stops, police stops, casino staff dealing with situations, folks prepping the fireworks.

Just a fantastic scanning experience that I wanted to share with everyone.

If anyone else has any good holiday scanning stories, please share them.

Cheers
 

KK4TTR

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I'm sure the in-laws were thrilled :)

We spent the weejkend on the coast. Lots of fireworks and boating. Glad your's was memorable, cheers!

Sent from my SM-N900P using Tapatalk
 

binaryecho

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My in-laws are awesome. They didn't mind at all. They know I am a geek and have to dip out every now and then to my own world. They just wanted updates when they heard sirens or saw something going down. ;-)
 

Jimru

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Sounds like fun! Reminds me of my early days monitoring the NYPD and FDNY as a kid with my Realistic Patrolman Mini. We had a great view of the Upper West Side of Manhattan (New York City) and I could often see what was going on in real time and monitor it at the same time (I was only monitoring the cops and FD in those days. It never occurred to me to monitor anything else!).
Good that your family allows you indulge your hobby and not make you feel guilty about it.
 

bluetone

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Glad to hear someone had some scanning fun on their vacation.

I had a very opposite experience.... I was on the coast in NC this past week and could hear basically no public service for Brunswick county, as well as adjacent municipalities. I have a new RS Pro-668 that has all modes and was up-to-date with my library, but no joy! I suppose they may be using something very proprietary or private???

73's, All.
 

N9JIG

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A couple years ago we had a room on the (almost) top floor of the MGM Grand in Vegas, overlooking the north end of McCarren Airport. It was all I could do to pry myself away from the window. I ran thru 4 sets of batteries and had to get more at the overpriced gift shop.

If I had a radar screen I could have been the control tower.
 

ratboy

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One of my best vacation ones was when I took my then new PRO-2004 down to Panama City, FL, and searched military air. The AF had F-15's chasing F4 drones out over the Gulf of Mexico and shooting them down and doing mock dogfights. There was a lot of traffic from Tyndall and Eglin bases 24/7. The local police and fire departments were pretty good to listen to also.
 

Jimru

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There are two really cool instances of monitoring NYPD that come to mind. One was monitoring a stake out in the 1980's on a citywide frequency. The cops were keeping tabs on this guy that must have been a big time drug dealer. There were multiple unmarked cars involved and they were following him. Every so often the units would change as they followed him, so as not to arouse suspicion. I had a map of the NYC Metro Area and I followed the action that originated in Manhattan, then into New Jersey and then back into the Bronx. There were even NYPD helo units involved. Funny thing is; after all that, they wrapped it up without an arrest! Apparently they just wanted to know who, what and where to build a case against this character and his associates.

Another cool instance: I was walking down Lexington Avenue in Manhattan and I noticed this guy wearing an Army surplus jacket walking quickly by me. He caught my attention, as he had kept one hand under the jacket. Then he brings out an HT and begins speaking into it in low tones. The HT was one of the huge Moto units the cops used in those days (1990's) and sure enough I could see NYPD in big block letters engraved in white on the side! So I stopped, let him walk ahead about a block as I put my scanner onto the NYPD TAC channels (I was monitoring the local precincts in my earbuds as I walked, which was normal for me at the time). Dontcha know that I heard the cop ahead of me talking to other cops in an unmarked car about a suspect they were following! I kept walking and they describe the guy and his location. He was one block behind me!! I stopped and looked in a bookstore window and sure enough the suspect walks by me. Oh man! I let them a get a couple of blocks ahead of me (no sense in getting shot). Finally the suspect goes into the subway at 68th and Lex. Two of the plainclothes cops go in behind him but they lose him as a train had pulled in right away, and he must have jumped on. At that point the cops in the unmarked car sped down to the next stop to see if they could find him. I lost them after that as the TAC channels are simplex and they were out of range once they left the area. Coolest scanning experience ever for me!
 

N9JIG

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Another great scanner experience was when I took my (then new) Icom R7000 to work and connected it to the huge VHF base station antenna on top of a 100 foot tower at my PD. A buddy and I arranged for a "Maintenance Window" for that channel for the midnight shift during what turned out to be a huge temperature inversion. From north suburban Chicago we were pulling in traffic from as far east as Pittsburgh, as far west as Omaha, south to past St. Louis and north to Winnipeg, all on VHF-Hi.

Later that summer I was down with the flu for a few days and one afternoon there started one of the best E-Layer events in years (late 1980's...). I was talking on 2M repeaters in Lima Ohio and Toluca IL from a handheld near Chicago. I logged stations from a dozen states and 2 provinces on the scanners before it finally died down late that night.
 

ratboy

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Some of my best times in my first CB periods was from about 1970 to about 1975 when I would be sick and stay home from school and the skip was just amazing. I had a world atlas that I wrote down contacts in and by the time I got out of high school in '74, I had the atlas full of contacts off to the side of the maps. I recorded a lot of them, but they seemed to be lost when I moved back in 1982. The only major area or country in the world I haven't talked to is Japan. For some reason, I've never made a contact there. I had Korea in my atlas and on tape in 1971.
 
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