"Hold traffic while I tone out Engine X"

[plaws]

Really? Can we not tone companies out on a different talkgroup? And can we, maybe, as cool as it is, drop the 1960s tone-outs and just send the run to the terminal in the stations and units?

Or am I just dreaming that there are nearly a dozen talkgroups available?


*sigh*

 

[n5bew1]

I hear that quite a bit.

 

[W8RMH]

Many departments "tone-out/dispatch runs only" on the dispatch channel, with all further comms moved to another talk group / channel such as a fireground or en route channel, which keeps the dispatch channel available for dispatches only.

 

[PaulSuperman]

Really? Can we not tone companies out on a different talkgroup? And can we, maybe, as cool as it is, drop the 1960s tone-outs and just send the run to the terminal in the stations and units?

Or am I just dreaming that there are nearly a dozen talkgroups available?


*sigh*

What fire dept. are you talking about? Why did you post this?

Many departments "tone-out/dispatch runs only" on the dispatch channel, with all further comms moved to another talk group / channel such as a fireground or en route channel, which keeps the dispatch channel available for dispatches only.

And some just use one channel, for everything.

 

[W8RMH]

What fire dept. are you talking about? Why did you post this?

And some just use one channel, for everything.

I believe the OP was asking why everything is done on one channel, thereby delaying other radio traffic, and I replied what MOST departments are now doing. I don't know where you are coming from.

 

[PaulSuperman]

I believe the OP was asking why everything is done on one channel, thereby delaying other radio traffic, and I replied what MOST departments are now doing. I don't know where you are coming from.

I was just answering the OP. What I have seen.

 

[plaws]

What fire dept. are you talking about? Why did you post this? And some just use one channel, for everything.

Doesn't matter who. The FD in question has a dispatch talkgroup, a significant number fireground talkgroups and a couple EMS talkgroups. One of the firegrounds is always patched to the dispatch channel, so is never used as a fireground. Everything else is on the dispatch channel. If someone (usually a field unit) thinks it's The Big One, the unit will request that traffic move to a fireground. Sometimes there will be The Big Two with traffic moved to a different fireground (always at the request of a field unit) and the dispatcher will usually remind the field unit that there will be "no one available to monitor that channel".

Uh, OK.

This would all be funny if I lived somewhere else.

 

[JoeyC]

Did it ever occur to you that only one person is running all the communications in this department? "no one to monitor", "hold traffic..", fireground channels patched all are telltale signs that this one person has enough to do and doesn't want to ask people to repeat stuff while they are trying to do 6 things at the same time.

 

[plaws]

Did it ever occur to you that only one person is running all the communications in this department? "no one to monitor", "hold traffic..", fireground channels patched all are telltale signs that this one person has enough to do and doesn't want to ask people to repeat stuff while they are trying to do 6 things at the same time.

And that's the problem.

 

[JoeyC]

And that's the problem.

Well, its not necessarily a problem. Any job will have busy and slow times and it makes no sense to overstaff for what may be 10% of the time. I'm sure if there were emergent traffic the unit told to "hold traffic" would transmit anyway and the dispatcher would understand. Most chatter can wait a minute anyway.

 

[fredva]

I'll echo what others said - Just because there are a dozen tac/fireground channels doesn't mean there are dispatchers to listen to all of them at the same time when there are several incidents going on. That's not a technology issue; that's a matter of staffing based on normal workload.

 

[highrider8433]

If the department in question is the one that I think it is always the duty aduty chief that asks for traffick to be moved. I've never heard or very seldem heard traffic on the ems channels.