Maryland FIRST 700mhz TRS

maus92

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The controversial tower at the ICC site has been erected. Two MW dishes are hung, and *maybe* a dipole element at the very top of the structure. Doesn't look like enough conduit is installed yet to support the both the county and the state RF infrastructure. Looks like final civvy stuff still needs to be completed.
 

motorcoachdoug

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I drive by that tower at least once or twice a week. Half the time their is no one there except a dozer and a couple of trailers .. For a long time there was nothing on the tower at all. Mabe they are waiting on shipments of wire and conduit to finish it up or waiting for a crew to do the high tower part..
 

maus92

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RCB Notes 9/16/2020

Tropical Storm Isaias impacts:
1 RF outage - Marion (Somerset County)
Shared site - Automatic Transfer switch failed
Somerset County site also failed
Outage lasted 1:02.

MW and fiber did not go offline, but had some momentary fading.

Zone 3 was very busy, particularly midday; Talbot site was the busiest.

Project Progress:
Phase 4
Table Rock ASR: structure should be complete 9/18/2020
440' tower
Motorola will then install equipment
Coverage testing to start in November, operational by end of year
Acceptance will close out Phase 4.

Phase 5
Charles County coverage testing to start October 1
Calvert and St Mary's will complete testing by December
Southern MD to go live by March 2021.

Montgomery and Prince George's coverage testing will begin once critical fiber is delivered
Go live date is May 2021

Georgia Ave ICC subsite: 250' tower and shelters complete, accepted by SHA 8/28/2020
"Most dramatic site" in system
Final paving of site starts tomorrow
NTP given to MontCo on 8/31/2020 to start their installation
Maryland FIRST equipment to start installation 9/28/2020.

Addon projects:

Converting Westminster ASR to Carroll County simulcast cell:
Westminster (convert from ASR to prime site)
Sykesville (new - there is an existing state tower on hospital grounds)
Taylorsville (new) - will significantly improve coverage.

Original system design was to use ISSI with Carroll County's system, but was tabled for additional ISSI testing. Decided it was more prudent to build out a simulcast site. Requested quotes from Motorola.

T1 to Ethernet conversion project: continuing.

Cherrytown Chicken ASR fully operational.

Operations:

A-G freq coordination with VA. Hoping to use A-G freqs in a multicast mode.

Crisfield ASR - shelter install by end of October, site in operation by the end of year.

Ocean City Antenna relocation: completed, informal coverage testing shows improvement. Waiting for user feedback.

Garrett County local users operational including consoles.

TV Hill RF site: Tower is failing structural assessment. MTA to study options

UPS replacement bore fruit: Chestertown prime site had a commercial power failure and a transfer switch failure, batteries were able to provide power even though the generator started and ran.

[Seems to me transfer switches are a single point of failure, but the UPS batteries mitigated the failure in this case. Not sure if parallel transfer switched can be installed, or perhaps a more reliable part considering two have failed over the past few months.]
 

maus92

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I took a road trip this evening to Calvert and Charles counties to check up on FIRST developments. It seems that Prince George's Simulcast, Charles Simulcast, Nice Bridge ASR and St. Mary's Simulcast are on the air in some form - that is, I was able to receive a control channel. The PG simulcast was denying traffic, except from the MIEMSS 7640 Aviation TG. I did not see any active traffic channels on the Charles, Nice Bridge, or St. Mary's sites, although I only monitored them for a few minutes. No control channel data was detected from the Calvert site, although I *may* have seen some intermittent BER testing. I'll have to look at the freqs to see if they belong to any particular site.

My *guess* would be the Montgomery Simulcast site will be 005-001, and the Calvert Simulcast site will be 005-003. Still unsure if there will be a Calvert Cliffs ASR.
 

boatbod

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RCB Notes 9/16/2020

Tropical Storm Isaias impacts:
Zone 3 was very busy, particularly midday; Talbot site was the busiest.

I can confirm that Talbot Fire/EMS went crazy for an hour or so as the backside eye wall of Isaias passed over. Winds went from light-to-moderate southerly to storm-force northerly in an instant. There were numerous calls county-wide for trees into buildings, flooding, downed electrical wires and a related fire of two. The whole county was on automatic medical assists (Fire accompanies EMS) and I think I recall times when there were 4+ incidents running in parallel. Busy day for sure!
 

motorcoachdoug

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and i still can not pick up the eastern shore on the md 1st system even tho i have my Yagi Antenna pointed that way but then I guess I am dreaming wishing that i could since I am in montgomery aspen hill area
 

maus92

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Wicomico County has their own P25 system. MSP Salisbury Barracks operates on FIRST. Both are able to operate on each others system directly using their home system subscribers, and both can use the state Interop talkgroups if necessary.

When FIRST was introduced on the Eastern Shore, Worcester, Ocean City and Somerset were using an EDACS system which was incompatible with P25. FIRST hosted patches to several agencies on the LES to allow its subscribers access to the EDACS system. I'm am not sure if those patches are still in service because they are not necessary anymore, and they consume system resources.
 
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motorcoachdoug

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Yes i know that Wicomico has their own system. I just finished programming it into my new KNG2 P800. I have it hooked to a Yagi Antenna on my balcony and the antenna aimed at the Howard County Tower. Montgomery does not have a tower yet but when the Georgia Ave and ICC tower goes live you can bet i will aim my antenna right at it since I am only 1 airmile from it.
 

maus92

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Are you expecting to hear Eastern Shore locality talkgroups being transmitted off the Montgomery (or Howard) County FIRST site? You won't for the most part, as most are regional thus not available statewide. I occasionally hear Queen Anne, Talbot or Caroline talkgroups off the Anne Arundel site, but that is probably because one of their EMS units is transporting to AAMC. Sometimes systems are designed to allow medical units to affiliate with distant sites that serve hospitals that EMS units are likely to visit.
 
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motorcoachdoug

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No not really tho i can wish but i do understand why they keep the transmissions to that regions only but it sure would be interesting to listen to. Think about it listing to Ocean City while in central MD or western MD especially if you are going to be traveling I68 or what kinds of weather they are dealing with..
 

riveter

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Yeah no except for the 1 regional MD TAC that's available statewide for each region, pretty much everything is site-fenced to stay within like 1 county from the oparea. Capacity is a delicate balance with a system like this, and FIRST is being very careful about managing capacity to reduce the need to pour in expansion costs.
 

boatbod

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Sometimes systems are designed to allow medical units to affiliate with distant sites that serve hospitals that EMS units are likely to visit.
I may - on rare occasions - have had a subscriber radio turned on to Talbot Fire Dispatch when running over to BWI or OC. I don't recall ever having got thrown off the system for being outside our regular area. Frankly it surprised me, but I imagine the number of times it happens is pretty small, so not much impact on system resources.
 

maus92

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Not knowing how officer portables are provisioned, perhaps some RIDs are exempt from fencing (if fencing could be that granular.) But if portables got swapped around, it would be harder to accurately enforce - I would assume it would be easier for mobiles. The other thing is AAMC is in the Anne Arundel cell, and so is BWI... I have no explanation for OC except *maybe* they don't want the fireman's convention to be blacked out, lol.
 

u2brent

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FYI,
I've been reviewing recordings from a Uniden SDS100 that's been sitting for a month (The SD card got filled up, So now the fun work begins of freeing up that space), and from Labor Day monitoring the Cecil Site I made this find.

Two Rocks SP Units using TG 7570 said "Let's switch to the Admin Channel" and they popped up on TG 7567 to continue their conversation.

Submitted..

TG 7567 Rocks State Park - Admin

Ugh, Still have 10 days worth of recordings remaining to review.
 
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