Hearing Alachua EMS on Hillsborough EDACS system

[Bolt21]

Hearing foreign EMS on Hillsborough EDACS system

Is anyone else in the Tampa Bay area hearing an Alachua or Gainesville EMS dept. on the Hillsborough EDACS Medevac LZ1 Talkgroup (0593/04-101)? TG is still being used for it's intended function as AeroMed/Bayflite LZ control (on the east site), but I also hear the Alachua area EMS interference as well from time to time.

I hear Medics (ex. Medic3) being dispatched and references to North Florida Hospital and AGH (Alachua General), so I figure it's either Alachua County or the City of Gainesville. Clarity is half-way decent for being so far away, although it has a "muffled" quality to it. Also hear a call sign ID'd in morse-code - AFK524. Tried to research this call sign, but no luck so far.

Anyone else ever heard this? I'm receiving on a PRO-97, BTW.

 

[pinellasfirefighter]

thats crazy,, i live in pinellas and the edacs system for hills come in ****ty here.. for you to be picking gainsville up so far is weird..

 

[Bolt21]

thats crazy,, i live in pinellas and the edacs system for hills come in ****ty here.. for you to be picking gainsville up so far is weird..

Yeah, I'm baffled to say the least. I don't know why, but it only comes in over that specific TalkGroup. I'm going to keep an ear on it and see if it stays on a particular frequency.

 

[pinellasfirefighter]

thats interesting... i dunno man..

 

[W4KRR]

What's even more amazing is that Alachua County/Gainsville system is digital, and the PRO-97 doesn't support digital.

 

[Bolt21]

What's even more amazing is that Alachua County/Gainsville system is digital, and the PRO-97 doesn't support digital.

Hence, why I'm baffled! Unless what I'm hearing is one of the UHF Med channels that somehow made its way to the Hillsborough system. Alachua uses the UHF channels as well.

 

[W4KRR]

Hence, why I'm baffled! Unless what I'm hearing is one of the UHF Med channels that somehow made its way to the Hillsborough system. Alachua uses the UHF channels as well.

That is the more likely explanation; you wouldn't be able to comprehend the digital audio on the PRO-97, it would just be noise.

 

[UFEMTFF]

My guess is that you may be hearing units transporting to those hospitals, but you are not hearing Alachua or Gainesville. Gainesville doesn't have transport units and Alachua county refers to their transport units as "rescues" You might be hearing another county giving a med report to those hospitals on UHF though.

Also, Alachua County Fire Rescue doesn't use UHF med channels to reach the hospitals anymore, they're on the 800 mhz system now.

 

[bravo14]

I was picking up Glynn Co Ga (Bruinswick) on Clay County channel that is far to hear it clear and lasted for a few hours it was riding over Clay... I can't pick up Gville or Daytona that much since I'm near Jacksonville sorry folks my live feed is down since my pro2067 is down due to not RX nothing....

 

[Bolt21]

My guess is that you may be hearing units transporting to those hospitals, but you are not hearing Alachua or Gainesville. Gainesville doesn't have transport units and Alachua county refers to their transport units as "rescues" You might be hearing another county giving a med report to those hospitals on UHF though.

I think you just nailed it. Armed with that tidbit of info, I'd say you're right. When I heard North FL and AGH mentioned, they were preceded by "transporting to." However, I am hearing calls being dispatched out, but no MedCom/EMS to Hospital activity.

Now if I could just figure out exactly who they are! It seems odd that I can't find their call sign in any FCC database.

 

[UFEMTFF]

I think you just nailed it. Armed with that tidbit of info, I'd say you're right. When I heard North FL and AGH mentioned, they were preceded by "transporting to." However, I am hearing calls being dispatched out, but no MedCom/EMS to Hospital activity.

Now if I could just figure out exactly who they are! It seems odd that I can't find their call sign in any FCC database.

If you're hearing calls paged out, you're hearing one of the local counties tac channels. I don't know if any are on UHF though, which is odd.

 

[Bolt21]

I heard them again this morning. The transmissions aren't limited to one frequency - they jump around in trunked-like fashion.

 

[wa2zdy]

Is it possible (I'm just taking a guess) the trunking system you are monitoring has a simulcast of a local UHF system that just happens to be the same freq as what you're hearing repeated?

Simulcasts were common in NJ. Some trunking systems would have a TG dedicated to repeating the "old" VHF or UHF frequency, and some did things the opposite way; where the "new" TG would be repeated back to the old frequency.

If the first case is what's happening here, the UHF receiver wouldn't know where the signal is coming from if the PL is correct - though you did say it's digital. And this is the time of year for enhanced propagation at VHF and even up to UHF sometimes too.

As I said, just an idea to ponder as I'm not familiar yet with the systems here. I was lucky in NJ - the entire county was on conventional high band and UHF systems. Only needed to worry about trunked stuff for the state police (boring) and the electric utility.

 

[Bolt21]

FINALLY heard a transmission that was clear enough to understand the origin!

It's Bradford County! "Medic## to Bradford" is what I heard.

It's the BCFR Tac 1 frequency (153.920). I can hear calls being dispatched and patient transports being called in, etc., etc. all on the Hillsborough EDACS LZ Control TalkGroup here in the Tampa area. Some crazy, crazy stuff goin' on here.

 

[Bolt21]

In addition, I just pulled up the recording I made of the morse code station license ID and, you guessed it, it's the Bradford license ID - KFK524.

When I first made the recording, I had it as AFK524, which comes up no record found in the FCC db. Now I realize that the first dash of the first "K" was chopped off of the beginning of the recording due to the scanner locking onto the transmission a split second after it began.

 

[UFEMTFF]

In addition, I just pulled up the recording I made of the morse code station license ID and, you guessed it, it's the Bradford license ID - KFK524.

When I first made the recording, I had it as AFK524, which comes up no record found in the FCC db. Now I realize that the first dash of the first "K" was chopped off of the beginning of the recording due to the scanner locking onto the transmission a split second after it began.

Glad you figured it out.

I looked at my previous post, and I hit it right on the money! When I worked for BCES, we transport patients to all of the hospitals in Gainesville, Jacksonville and Lake City - So that's why you'd be hearing all of those names. I'll have to give the ES Director over there a call let him know he's being heard all the way over there.

Edit:

If you were hearing EMS--> Hospital patient reports, chances are it wasn't on 153.92. That's the operations/paging channel. The hospitals are almost always contacted via the UHF Med channels. Only if they can't be reached will they relay info through dispatch and have them contact the ER on landline.

 

[Bolt21]

If you were hearing EMS--> Hospital patient reports, chances are it wasn't on 153.92.

Nope, not hearing patient reports or any MedCom-like activity. I hear "Medic## transporting to AGH(example)" and calls being dispatched. The KFK524/153.920 is the same freq I hear when I drive through Bradford on the way to Jacksonville. Definitely the same frequency.

 

[gcr33]

A patched link, either permanent or accidently left patched?

 

[Bolt21]

A patched link, either permanent or accidently left patched?

Bradford and Hillsborough are about 150 miles apart, so I don't think this would be the case. The distance that this is happening over is half of what makes this so crazy. The other half being a VHF conventional freq coming in over a 800MHz EDACS TalkGroup.

 

[UFEMTFF]

Bradford and Hillsborough are about 150 miles apart, so I don't think this would be the case. The distance that this is happening over is half of what makes this so crazy. The other half being a VHF conventional freq coming in over a 800MHz EDACS TalkGroup.

Well, I just got off the phone with the Emergency Services Director in Bradford. He thought that was pretty funny, but had no idea how it was happening. He said there is no patch, as we suspected.

Is it always coming across on the same TG ID? What about frequency? I wonder if it only occurs on a certain TG/Frequency combination.

It is a mystery!

EDIT: Just realized you posted the TG in the OP. But my other questions still apply.