Info About Hoopa Indian FD in Humboldt County CA

[zerg901]

The other day eDispatches.com showed 2 calls for Hoopa FD. Checking the Hoopa FD feed at Broadcastify, the comms were found in the archive. Digging thru 3 or 4 recordings yields -

5/30/2021 - 250 PM tape - 302 PM - "Hoopa Volunteers" are paged to Telescope Road for a fire - dispatcher audio seems to be peaking out / over modulated a bit - at 309 PM 2 pager sets go out and Hoopa Vols are again requested to Telescope Rd to protect blds from a one acre fire - on 320 PM tape - one click / kerchunk is heard at 1825 on the tape or approx 340 PM - on the 420 PM tape - 26 minutes in or at approx 440 PM there is 1 message from "9614 on OES Command - returning to station" - and that message is acknowledged by the dispatcher.

The Broadcastify feed shows 156.195 as the freq. But the FCC license shows 156.195 as a mobile only channel. 156.195 might be paired with 153.86R or 153.995R. WQIX222

I could swear I saw a listing for a Hoopa OES channel somewhere. Was that on the CalFire channel load from 2019 or 2020?

The RR Wiki for Humboldt County shows '9600' as the Hoopa Structure FD - so that matches.

RRDB shows 155.385R as Hoopa Net / Public Safety Dispatch / Multi Dispatch - (in the CA Federal section)

Next -lets try to find Telescope Road. That might tell us if the feed is receiving a repeater output channel or a repeater input channel.

This is an interesting FD. There have been comments about it in this forum before. It seems to be a combined Federal / tribal wildfire / structural agency. You can see the 2 adjacent stations in Google Street View. A big 5 bay station and a small 3 bay station. The Hoopa FD/OES Facebook page has a 2020 photo of Eng 9542 - so that confirms that 2 different Humboldt County IDs are in play. The Wildand FD reportedly has approx 10 yearround employees plus seasonal staff. Maybe the 10 yearround Wildland FD employees also make up the nucleus of the Structural FD.

 

[zerg901]

following up -

Telescope Rd is near the fire station so that doesnt tell us much

there are several channels licensed by Hoopa Fire - several with unknown uses

Digging thru some Internet sources - there is no Hoopa FD registered with the Secretary of State - but there is a Hoopa Business Council ish - maybe that is their legal basis from the 1970s (mentioned online) - the Hoopa OES Director under the Wildland FD is also the Chief of the Hoopa Structural FD - so there is some tie in there - the Structural Fire Station might be over at the Utility Dept - not next to the Wildand Fire Station

Cant find the freq list that I had with color on every page - pretty sure there was a Hoopa EMA/Command channel listed there

6/1/2021 - starting at 409 pm - multi pages for Vols to set up LZ at Hoopa Airport - Reach 18 is due from Redding at 1630 to pick up a gunshot victim being transported from Orleans by Ambulance 82

Per 2020 cdf freq load - there is also a BIA Admin channel with 172.775 R PL 0.0 and 171.725 input - maybe at Hoopa - there is also HIA FD Tac 4 on 155.10 - and Hoopa Amb on 155.025R PL 0.0

 

[es93546]

The Hoopa Reservation is a bit different as far as dispatching as it is a "Level 4" dispatch center. The four levels are 1-NIFC, 2-GACC, 3-the primary initial attack fire zone, and 4-local dispatch zones within the primary zone. The use of Level 4 is not encouraged and many have been merged into the level 3 centers. Level 3 dispatch centers coordinate directly with the GACC's. Level 4 dispatch centers coordinate with a Level 3 center. The Level 3 centers are the lowest level of "ordering points." So the relationship between the Level 3 and Level 4 dispatch centers is almost always a logistical and training one. Some ICS training is organized by Level 3 centers, some by GACC and a few high level courses put on by NIFC alone. The federal North Coast ICC and the state's Fortuna ECC are both level 3's and in this case the Hoopa Reservation dispatch center coordinates with the North Coast ICC as it is a federal reservation. This reservation used to coordinate with Fortuna, but now is with North Coast. Most reservations use federally allocated frequencies for wildland fire. A few use federal freqs for law enforcement as well. Most get FCC licenses for law enforcement and sometimes for structural fire departments. The reservation sovereignty principle is at play in this. Don't ask me to explain that further.

You are likely talking about the Hoopa Fire Department not registering with the California Secretary of State. I would guess that this a indian reservation sovereignty issue as well. I don't think the reservations are subject to state corporation laws, land use laws (including building and zoning codes of county/city departments) and maybe some others I haven't thought of. They might not be subject to local enforcement of water and sewage laws as well. They are subject to the Clean Water Act, a federal act, but it might be enforced on a federal level. I've been around these issues a little bit, enough to know that this is a can of worms that attorneys spend their whole careers working on.

I have no idea what they are referring to as an OES frequency. There are a ton of those. It might be one of the V-Fire frequencies. The OES has a few repeater nets on VHF High, those being state fire nets 1 & 2 (154.1600 and 154.2200 if memory serves me) and the California State Emergency Radio System, CSERS on 153.7550. I don't think the fire nets have coverage there and I'm not sure of CSERS. People local to the area would know far more.

 

[zerg901]

I think that Hoopa OES has their own "Hoopa OES Command Channel". And maybe they page the "Hoopa Volunteers" on that channel.

And from above - "the Hoopa OES Director under the Wildland FD is also the Chief of the Hoopa Structural FD - so there is some tie in there"

 

[norcalscan]

Remember, besides state and county OES, there can be city OES and in this case, tribal OES. In this case, the acronym for OES is just the same as PD or FD or CSD. So none of this "has" to be related to the California Governor's Office of Emergency Services.