Question about airport paging system

[kmacka]

At my local airport the maintenance workers are also the airport firefighters. They are trained in ARFF and EMT's. They all carry radios but they also carry minitor pagers that alert them to a problem with an aircraft. When the tower gets word from an aircraft that they might or they do have a problem, the tower sets off the pagers and the men then hurry to the firehouse and standby on the ready. I was wondering if it is possible to set my pro-97 to receive this emergency pager tone. I basically want my scanner to sit on the frequency and tone, like their pagers do, when there is an emergency declared by the tower. I don't know if this is the same thing as volunteer firefighter pagers or what. Please help thanks.

 

[bezking]

It's probably the same as an fd.

 

[kmacka]

Ok. If it is the same as an fd, what information do I need to have the tones go off on my scanner.

 

[w0fg]

The dispatch frequency.

 

[b7spectra]

I don't believe your Pro-97 has the tone capability (someone correct me if I'm wrong). The Pro-96 has it. What you would have to do is ascertain what the tone out "tones" are and program them into the scanner. There are also some Motorola portables that will do it as well (I used to have a MT1000 programmed on my local station tone so at night it would go off when they got toned out). You could always call the FD there and ask them if they know what the tones are (but most likely they won't and you will be referred to the radio shop).

 

[kmacka]

Let me ask this question. Lets say I buy a moto minitor. And then I go to my local motorola shop. It your experience, would they give me a hard time if I asked them to program my minitor in the same fashion as the one's that are used by the airport? I mean the minitors don't have any transmit capabilities.

 

[SkipSanders]

As the Minitor is a voice pager, I'd expect them to give you a hassle, yes, it being illegal in the US to monitor voice paging. Only pure tone pagers are 'legal' to monitor.

Of course, what any given 'shop' will do is only to be discovered by asking.

I'm not sure quite how they'd handle a normal voice comm channel that happens to also have tone paging on it.

 

[N_Jay]

As the Minitor is a voice pager, I'd expect them to give you a hassle, yes, it being illegal in the US to monitor voice paging. Only pure tone pagers are 'legal' to monitor.

Of course, what any given 'shop' will do is only to be discovered by asking.

I'm not sure quite how they'd handle a normal voice comm channel that happens to also have tone paging on it.

I think the laws on monitoring "Paging" only apply to Telephone/Radio paging systems and not ancillary paging on Part 90 channels.

Anyone know the facts for sure?

 

[kmacka]

As the Minitor is a voice pager, I'd expect them to give you a hassle, yes, it being illegal in the US to monitor voice paging. Only pure tone pagers are 'legal' to monitor.

Of course, what any given 'shop' will do is only to be discovered by asking.

I'm not sure quite how they'd handle a normal voice comm channel that happens to also have tone paging on it.

Now you say voice paging. These pagers that the arff personnel carry, they are motorola minitors but they only make a beeping noise for a couple of seconds and then open up like it sounds like you open up the squelch. No voice whatsover.

 

[b7spectra]

If they are on a dispatch frequency and they activate when they are toned, then there is no law against it. It's the same as having a portable with tone receive capability. The minitor just stays quiet unless a specific 1, 2 or 4 tone sequence activates it. The biggest thing is finding out what the tones are. Radio shop may not give you too much of a hassle if it is just a monitor only.