NPS Carlsbad Caverns, not receiving traffic

[SkepticalEd]

Hi all. I recently got back into scanning after a very long pause. The scanners I had were analog only, so I got a BCD996P2, but I don't hear any traffic from Carlsbad Caverns. CC used to have multiple repeaters, including Water Tank, Walnut Canyon, and Backcountry, but it appears none of them are active. They also used to use GUMO's Bush Mountain repeater, which used to have fantastic range (output 164.425, input 164.9875, and was two 5-watt King portables with a duplexer, created by a guy I knew). I went backpacking up to Bush Mountain in 2018, and took a photo of the Bush tower. It has two high gain antennas (assuming both are VHF), so I'm surprised I hear absolutely nothing from either GUMO backcountry rangers, or Caverns personnel, since it appears they only have one direct channel (164.600) Any info if I'm doing something wrong or missing something would be appreciated.

 

[SkepticalEd]

 

[KE5ZBG]

What's in the DB is 164.6000 P25 NAC 4CE for Caverns, and 169.7125 for GUMO Fire - but the input of 169.2375 is wrong. I would scan the first two in both analog and digital, though it's very possible they've changed frequencies.

Do you by any chance have coordinates for that tower? I was having trouble finding it on satellite imagery.

 

[SkepticalEd]

Certainly. 31.92975, -104.87955, based on the location plotted in my Gaia GPS. I pulled up the sat in Earth, and it's hard to see, but it's there. You can spot the solar panels. Hope this helps.

 

[SkepticalEd]

BTW. the coordinates are from just east of the tower, where I was standing, which is just west off the trail.

 

[KE5ZBG]

May be they have some agreement with the USFS to use Dark Canyon, Queen and Sitting Bull Falls on 173.7750 (103.5)

 

[ecps92]

the input is/was 162.2375 maybe a typo somewhere long the line

What's in the DB is 164.6000 P25 NAC 4CE for Caverns, and 169.7125 for GUMO Fire - but the input of 169.2375 is wrong. I would scan the first two in both analog and digital, though it's very possible they've changed frequencies.

Do you by any chance have coordinates for that tower? I was having trouble finding it on satellite imagery.

 

[Giddyuptd]

Last I knew Bush was used for dispatch type deals IF law enforcement needed it but they have access to other repeater with nps and usfs.

Local operations were the cav direct which you literally had to be on top of the place and I recall not much traffic really unless they truly needed to and something was occurring. In analog a pl was used not csq. They had access to analog but rarely used it. P25 was the priority to go to and they used the listed nac as I had it in a list and verified it. It is a car to car frequency direct and you had to be literally in vicinity of the museum and other areas if used. The caves good luck comms were hit or miss and most had other means to communicate if needed. You say you have a analog scanner so you'd need a p25 capable.

Only thing I can think is below,

Frequency change
Nac change
700mhz use

Keep in mind 700 is being built and some are playing with it.

Eddy County plans to go on 700 and were messing with sites. Whether or not they have started building or applied in licensing who knows. I haven't checked.

What radios was the nps rangers using? At the time they were using the apx single knob single band. I know some recently around Southern NM and West Texas have been seen witg apx8000s or all band Harris.

I do know some changes have been made around some federal users. Not much where I am but other areas I've heard they did minor changes.

Was your radio in csq or was it using the old cav direct pl tone?

So to be clear the cav direct is low power or was portable to portable. I never heard it used past the museum or caves or the ranger barracks and it was 99 percent if not 100 percent p25.

The nps LE have access Eddy County law channels and Texas end law channels and will use whatever area they are in for their stops or checks etc being there is only less than a handful on any given time depending where they are at will determine what channel they are using using for LE stops and check outs which they do use Eddy s.o. but scan bush and bull. I know some p25 is used on and off on the south Lincoln forest area and federal end but analog is mainly used.

 

[Giddyuptd]

164.425 164.9875 were old pairs I had but I don't recall what caverns used those pairs for. By now I'm not sure if they are defunct but they were old pairs.

 

[mass-man]

Don’t forget it’s summer in the desert…not a lot of visitors to Guadalupe right now! Talked to a couple of NPS LE folks at a Blue Origin launch and they said summer is really boring for them!

 

[Giddyuptd]

Hi all. I recently got back into scanning after a very long pause. The scanners I had were analog only, so I got a BCD996P2, but I don't hear any traffic from Carlsbad Caverns. CC used to have multiple repeaters, including Water Tank, Walnut Canyon, and Backcountry, but it appears none of them are active. They also used to use GUMO's Bush Mountain repeater, which used to have fantastic range (output 164.425, input 164.9875, and was two 5-watt King portables with a duplexer, created by a guy I knew). I went backpacking up to Bush Mountain in 2018, and took a photo of the Bush tower. It has two high gain antennas (assuming both are VHF), so I'm surprised I hear absolutely nothing from either GUMO backcountry rangers, or Caverns personnel, since it appears they only have one direct channel (164.600) Any info if I'm doing something wrong or missing something would be appreciated.

What I have for last recent Bush output is 169.71250 @ 127.3

 

[lhillin]

I live in Van Horn, Culberson County, it is the county that the Guadalupe Mountains National Park (GMNP) is in. I frequently hear the GMNP personnel on 169.7125, as Giddyuptd, posted. They do not get on the radio that often, just a few times over the course of a day. The dispatch office for them is located somewhere in Alamogordo, New Mexico. The law enforcement rangers also have access to the Texas Department of Public Safety dispatcher in Pecos, Texas on 159.2175.

 

[Giddyuptd]

The new dispatch center for federal is at he federal and usfs building in North alamogordo. Definitely better than the old federal where some channels had severe static and old fed building was given to their county and some bafoon decided to remove the dispatch room remodel it which had latest technology at time.

The caverns direct is just that for the caves and museum or immediate vicinity of that hill. Other operations will occur on Bush or respective repeaters for that area the rangers are in.

 

[rbuxton]

The new dispatch center for federal is at he federal and usfs building in North alamogordo. Definitely better than the old federal where some channels had severe static and old fed building was given to their county and some bafoon decided to remove the dispatch room remodel it which had latest technology at time.

The caverns direct is just that for the caves and museum or immediate vicinity of that hill. Other operations will occur on Bush or respective repeaters for that area the rangers are in.

So in summary,,,, be patient when monitoring. They're there but not having much to talk about over the radio. I live a few miles east of Mesa Verde NP..... not a busy place but there is chatter from time to time. So I can relate to the lack of radio traffic.

 

[es93546]

Last I knew Bush was used for dispatch type deals IF law enforcement needed it but they have access to other repeater with nps and usfs.

Local operations were the cav direct which you literally had to be on top of the place and I recall not much traffic really unless they truly needed to and something was occurring. In analog a pl was used not csq. They had access to analog but rarely used it. P25 was the priority to go to and they used the listed nac as I had it in a list and verified it. It is a car to car frequency direct and you had to be literally in vicinity of the museum and other areas if used. The caves good luck comms were hit or miss and most had other means to communicate if needed. You say you have a analog scanner so you'd need a p25 capable.

Only thing I can think is below,

Frequency change
Nac change
700mhz use

Keep in mind 700 is being built and some are playing with it.

Eddy County plans to go on 700 and were messing with sites. Whether or not they have started building or applied in licensing who knows. I haven't checked.

What radios was the nps rangers using? At the time they were using the apx single knob single band. I know some recently around Southern NM and West Texas have been seen witg apx8000s or all band Harris.

I do know some changes have been made around some federal users. Not much where I am but other areas I've heard they did minor changes.

Was your radio in csq or was it using the old cav direct pl tone?

So to be clear the cav direct is low power or was portable to portable. I never heard it used past the museum or caves or the ranger barracks and it was 99 percent if not 100 percent p25.

The nps LE have access Eddy County law channels and Texas end law channels and will use whatever area they are in for their stops or checks etc being there is only less than a handful on any given time depending where they are at will determine what channel they are using using for LE stops and check outs which they do use Eddy s.o. but scan bush and bull. I know some p25 is used on and off on the south Lincoln forest area and federal end but analog is mainly used.

I'm a little confused, are you suggesting that a federal agency would build a radio system on 700 MHz? The federal government does not have any frequencies allocated on that band.

 

[Giddyuptd]

I'm a little confused, are you suggesting that a federal agency would build a radio system on 700 MHz? The federal government does not have any frequencies allocated on that band.

The State of New Mexico is building out a 700mhz system giving Federal access to it. It is deigned for only public safety.

Tests were done around carlsbad area and around the forest areas with transportable sites. The results were good. They will he giving them access. It is not uncommon for agencies to have talkgroups on local systems aside form their vhf or uhf respective setups.

 

[es93546]

The State of New Mexico is building out a 700mhz system giving Federal access to it. It is deigned for only public safety.

Tests were done around carlsbad area and around the forest areas with transportable sites. The results were good. They will he giving them access. It is not uncommon for agencies to have talkgroups on local systems aside form their vhf or uhf respective setups.

Ok, but Carlsbad Caverns NP will still have a VHF High radio system and we don't seem to know if those frequencies have been changed. The local 700 MHz system is not for the National Park Service to use as a substitute for their VHF High system and their own dispatcher. The talkgroups on 700 Mhz trunked systems are not unusual as, for example, in California Riverside County has talkgroups for the Bureau of Land Management. This is done in order to provide county and BLM units a way of directly communicating with each other. The BLM still uses their own VHF High system and the Federal Interagency Comm Center in San Bernardino for primary communications.

I've noticed that the NPS is beginning to regionalize its dispatching in some areas, where several small parks are linked to a larger park that provides dispatching for a group of parks. Most often these regionalized dispatch centers operate 24/7. Yosemite and Sequoia-Kings Canyon National Parks in California provide dispatching services for Lassen Volcanic, Pinnacles and Channel Islands, just to name a few. I wonder if Carlsbad and Guadalupe are part of a larger network for dispatching.

 

[es93546]

I live in Van Horn, Culberson County, it is the county that the Guadalupe Mountains National Park (GMNP) is in. I frequently hear the GMNP personnel on 169.7125, as Giddyuptd, posted. They do not get on the radio that often, just a few times over the course of a day. The dispatch office for them is located somewhere in Alamogordo, New Mexico. The law enforcement rangers also have access to the Texas Department of Public Safety dispatcher in Pecos, Texas on 159.2175.

Most of the time, outside of California, dispatch centers for an interagency zone don't provide law enforcement dispatching, just fire, but from what you hear they may actually be doing this. Both Guadalupe and Carlsbad Caverns are in the "Pecos Zone" for interagency dispatch purposes. This is from that Zone's dispatch center web page under "about us":


Alamogordo Interagency Dispatch Center (ADC) is located in Alamogordo, New Mexico. The Alamogordo Air Tanker Base is located on the same compound as our building.

ADC performs dispatch duties for the southeastern part of New Mexico and west Texas. The area's topography varies from the flat grass lands of Carlsbad, New Mexico to the 9,000 feet elevation of the Sacramento Mountains.

The center serves as communication hubs for six state and federal agencies, with 16 cooperators from the Department of Interior, Department of Agriculture and New Mexico State Forestry. Approximately 22,000,000 acres are under the protection of ADC.

ADC disperses fire personnel, equipment, crews and air resources to each fire incident and maintains communication between fire resources, management, and other agencies, such as fire departments. The center serves as dispatch point-of-contact for the Pecos Zone (PEZ) and provides wildland fire and all-risk incident support to the PEZ partner agencies. Together the PEZ partner agencies manage an average of 500+- fire incidents per year. The center is responsible primarily for wildland fire preparedness and suppression support activities, but may support all-risk incidents as needed or directed.

This from their home page:

Operating as an all-risk dispatch facility, ADC is the primary focus for reporting, tracking, and processing orders of aircraft, equipment, overhead, crews, and supplies assigned to incidents in southeast New Mexico and West Texas.

It does not directly state that they provide 24 hour per day or even 8 hour a day law enforcement dispatching, but maybe they do. The Pecos Zone covers much of southwest Texas as well, with Big Bend National Park within the zone as well. I wonder if that park is dispatched out of Alamogordo as well.

 

[es93546]

the input is/was 162.2375 maybe a typo somewhere long the line

Bill has it right, the official listing for the "NPS Bush" repeater is 169.7125 output and 162.2375 input.

The official listing for the Alamogordo Interagency Dispatch Center has not listed a separate frequency for Carlsbad Caverns National Park. I wonder if both Guadalupe and Carlsbad Caverns are both dispatched using the Bush repeater. The old 164.6000 might be an in-cave simplex only. Just a guess, it's been over 41 years since I visited Alamogordo and Carlsbad Caverns.

 

[Giddyuptd]

They do utilize their federal end however southern NM NPS and USFS LE does use local county law enforcement channels for check outs and traffic stops. Rarely have they ran anything through their dispatch. The only entity who does utilize their dispatch in federal end is BIA.