Humboldt County CA - 2020 fire freqs info

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zerg901

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per the 2020 calfire freq list - RRDB has all of the correct info - except for -

Shelter Cove Fire Repeater - 155.94 R - PL 146.2

Rio Fire - 153.77 - PL 173.8

Fortuna Fire - 154.235 R - PL 203.5 - 156.105 input

Fortuna Fire Tac 1 - 153.83 - PL 203.5 on mobile xmit

Fortuna Fire Tac 2 - 154.31 - PL 203.5 on mobile xmit - channel is used for traffic control

Honeydew Fire - 154.445 - PL 0.0

Fieldbrook Fire Tac - 154.205 - PL 151.4
 

n6hgg

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Looks like Eureka Fire has gone digital this last week on 154.37. Nothing mentioned about it here or in the database. The internet audio feed is not feeding the fire dept now because of this recent change.
 

norcalscan

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Looks like Eureka Fire has gone digital this last week on 154.37. Nothing mentioned about it here or in the database. The internet audio feed is not feeding the fire dept now because of this recent change.

Any change in freq that you know of or just the switch to P25? I'll be over there later this week and can sniff around to find NAC's and whatnot. The north coast use to be the last spot in CA where you can run VHF high with no tone protection it was so clean up there. And now P25 is infiltrating...not sure many people over there even have digital scanners because there was no need unless you were interested in the prison.
 

n6hgg

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Yea, no technical details for you, sorry, I don't own a digital scanner... yet. Last week the analog traffic disappeared on 154.37 and was replaced by digital hash sounding identical to the digital hash on Eureka PD's 154.95 primary frequency and yea the PD uses P25 I guess. I would guess that the fire dept is also P25. When the change happened last week, the fire dept simultaneously disappeared on the internet audio feed for Humboldt county. Earlier by about a month, I heard the same idententical digital hash appear on the older fire frequency of 153.95. Yea it's creeping in. Whoever is providing the scanner audio feed obviously has digital receive capabiliy since the PD is being streamed. I am on the hunt for a digital setup. Don't know who else owns one up here but for disaster work involving communications infrastructure failure, as a ham operator for decades I need to keep up with things. I need to be as "infrastructure independent" as is possible to be of service to the public in those more difficult times that I hope never arrive.
 
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norcalscan

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Last week the analog traffic disappeared on 154.37 and was replaced by digital hash sounding identical to the digital hash on Eureka PD's 154.95 primary frequency and yea the PD uses P25 I guess. I would guess that the fire dept is also P25.

Interesting - yeah I just saw the PD switched to P25 it looks like last Fall? They were analog in August last I was over there. I'll poke around when I'm over there this week. With the number of VFD's and Arcata and CalFire all on the outskirts, I wonder what mutual aid looks like on a larger incident in the city, if the fire tacs are analog still or what.
 

norcalscan

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So far, finding Eureka FD 154.370 is P25 NAC $293. N6HGG the digital hash is just that, the digital P25 traffic, the traffic is conventional, not trunked so there is no control channel (which would be a continuous data transmission with voice traffic on other frequencies.) Both Eureka PD and FD are in the clear. Unknown if the fire tacs are P25 as well, however the database and I've confirmed Eureka PD3 tac is P25. I'll submit for the fire dispatch change. Anybody in the future finding this post, program the Eureka fire tacs in mixed mode, or a digital one and analog one until we confirm.
 

n6hgg

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Thanks, nice work. I'm schooling up my digital scanning so it's all pretty interesting. I've been a passive scanner nut for 50 years, since the crystal days.
 

norcalscan

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Thanks, nice work. I'm schooling up my digital scanning so it's all pretty interesting. I've been a passive scanner nut for 50 years, since the crystal days.
I hear you on scanning since the crystal days. Hearing the neighbor's crystal scanner is what got me into this mess back in early 90's. I've always been a few years behind the trends just because NorCal has always been analogous to VHF-Analog, much like your sliver of coast. The metropolis of Redding had 800Mhz and that was fancy back then. Now with National Parks, BRICS and CRIS and some Fed 3 letters agencies I get to spool up on P25, TDMA/FDMA, simulcast, etc. which is old news to many other members here haha.

On any channel in your scanner that you're hearing that digital hash noise, that's P25 traffic being passed. It's a distinctive sound you'll learn to recognize. I submitted just the Eureka Fire Dispatch channel since that's all I could confirm during the time I was there. If you notice the fire tac channels or any other channels with that noise on it, can you submit those changes to the database, and/or post them here so someone can? If you have a P25 scanner, try programming each of those fire tacs twice, the first one being digital-only with NAC search, and the second being analog-only.

Does Eureka Fire play with the county well? There was a garage explosion and heavy residential fire in Arcata when I was there, and their 2nd and 3rd alarm kept pulling in more distant departments in the county but no Eureka Fire (that I recall) or CalFire resources. Thinking of interoperability where county departments have or don't have P25 capable radios to roll into Eureka if mutual aid was needed, if those fire tacs were indeed digital like dispatch. Even with dispatch/incident command being P25 and incoming mutual aid resources not getting the situational awareness as they respond in. Heaven forbid a 6+ hits over there and y'all can't talk amongst yourselves waiting for the 3hr response from Redding and north bay.
 

officer_415

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Does anyone know if 155.610 Eureka PD is still used, and if so, has it been converted to digital? It doesn't appear to be licensed.
 

KK6MPT

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Humboldt Bay Fire and all of the surrounding fire departments participate in Auto Mutual Aide agreements. I've heard them all respond to each others incidents without hesitation, including some of the smaller departments like Samoa Peninsula and Fieldbrook Fire. Humboldt Bay and Arcata regularly respond to each others incidents.
 

officer_415

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Humboldt Bay Fire and all of the surrounding fire departments participate in Auto Mutual Aide agreements. I've heard them all respond to each others incidents without hesitation, including some of the smaller departments like Samoa Peninsula and Fieldbrook Fire. Humboldt Bay and Arcata regularly respond to each others incidents.

Do the other agencies have P25 radios to communicate with Humboldt Bay Fire?
 

KK6MPT

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So far only Humboldt Bay Fire and Eureka Police Department are running P25. Although, the Humboldt County Sheriff's Department is slated to move to P25 soon. My understanding is they are installing their new repeaters. As far as fire agencies, Humboldt Bay Fire is switching to analog radios when communicating with allied agencies. I've heard them on Arcata Fire District's radio channels and the county fire net.
 

officer_415

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As far as fire agencies, Humboldt Bay Fire is switching to analog radios when communicating with allied agencies. I've heard them on Arcata Fire District's radio channels and the county fire net.

I was more wondering what happens when other agencies respond to Humboldt Bay incidents.
 

KK6MPT

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If I recall correctly, I'm hearing them on Humboldt Bay Fire's radio frequency. This makes me think there must be some sort of simulcast in place to recieve their analog transmissions. I'll confirm this the next time I hear an outside fire agency respond into Humboldt Bay's response area.
 

iscanvnc2

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I’ve always accepted the incompatibility of analog and P25 radios as expressed in this thread. Then I read
Talking to the World via Amateur Radio Digital Voice
By Larry Van Horn N5FPW
in the August edition of THE SPECTRUM MONITOR.

Under the section headed Commercially Developed Digital Mode Used by Hams is the following paragraph:
“P25 is an open architecture, user driven suite of system standards that define digital radio communications system architectures capable of serving the needs of Public Safety and Government organizations. A P25 radio is any radio that conforms to the P25 standard in the way it functions or operates. P25 compliant radios can communicate in analog mode with legacy radios and in either digital or analog mode with other P25 radios. The P25 standard exists in the public domain, allowing any manufacturer to produce a P25 compatible radio product.”

The BOLD is mine. It is a non-qualified statement, not limited to Ham radios. If true, there would be no incompatibility. A P25 system would revert to analog when requiring assistance from analog units. Apparently the statement is incorrect for public service systems

Let the comments begin
 

officer_415

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P25 radios can communicate on analog channels fine; the problem is when mutual aid units with analog radios respond to a jurisdiction with a P25 system. The jurisdiction would need to have analog repeaters in place in order for the mutual aid units to communicate with them (or they could use a simplex analog channel).
 

iscanvnc2

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If P25 radios can can communicate on analog why not repeaters? A repeater that spits out whatever it receives. I'm sure such exist.
 

officer_415

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There are mixed-mode repeaters that will broadcast P25 or analog, depending on what's received. But if the local units are using P25 mode, the outside unit with an analog-only radio won't be able to hear them.

It might be easier to think about this in terms of backwards compatibility. P25 (newer) radios will work on both P25 and analog, but analog (older) radios won't work on P25 (newer) systems.
 

norcalscan

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This isn't a technical problem, it's a human problem. Likely a combination of one, the radio tech not understanding the true needs of the fire department and not programming analog versions of the channels, (and potential conflict of interest if he sold them a bag of P25 goods, "then why would we need to go back to that obsolete analog if P25 is so good?" and two, end users not knowing how/when to switch to analog. And don't forget the high safety risk when switching tac channels in the middle of a working incident.
 
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