Question about Sonoma County fire radio channels

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Paysonscanner

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What is heard on 151.46 R? Is that dispatch for approx 10 Calfire stations and Cloverdale FD?

What channel is Healdsburg FD dispatched on?

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Sonoma County California - map of fire stations - Google My Maps - zerg90 map of fire stations in Sonoma County

151.4600 is designated by Cal Fire as "LNU Local West" in that area. The Lake-Napa unit includes Sonoma County as well. Local dispatch frequencies are generally reserved for initial attack only, extended attack incidents are moved to other command frequencies as soon as possible, mostly the next day. Which command is used depends on coverage of the various command frequency repeater sites. Commands 1 (151.3550) and 2 (151.2650) are generally used for dispatch to incident command post communications, depending on the command repeater needs of the incident. I don't know what stations and/or area LNU Local West covers. Cal Fire has one command frequency pair reserved for portable repeater use, 151.1675 out/159.3975 in. However, the NIFC system works better on large incidents with varied topography. The number of portable repeaters and UFH linking capability, in addition to the number of frequencies available, makes the NIFC system superior to what Cal Fire can put on the ground in a short time.

Given the increasing fire activity in California and elsewhere, maybe the state radio agency is thinking of building a portable repeater system similar to NIFC's. California is a tough place to get frequencies that can cover the entire state, given the number of systems in place to handle the 40 million people living in the state. The pool of available for the state to use for VHF frequencies for repeaters and UHF frequencies for links has to be very limited. If the feds and state have multiple and simultaneous large incidents providing sufficient frequencies could be hard. One step in the right direction was for the state to increase the number of tactical frequencies to 37 shortly after the narrowband era began in 2013. These frequencies are used as air ground and air air frequencies as well. I met my late husband in 1973 and we married in 1978. He shared with me the conditions of the 1970 fire season in California. It marked the beginning of a new era of large fires and resulted in the Congress directing the federal wildland fire agencies to come up with a new way to manage fires. The FIRESCOPE organization and the Incident Command System were developed. If another similar number and location of fires occurs in the fire era we are in now, it would really challenge what is in place now.

Hubby and I lived in a town in the Sierra foothills that had a big Cal Fire presence. We had some friends who worked for them. My late hubby would ask them a lot of questions, not only about radio, but the fire situation in general. They spent time with him because he was a volunteer on our local FD. I'm using his notes and my memory of our conversations to answer a lot of posts.
 

Paysonscanner

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A correction on the above post. Nearly every dispatch for vegetation fires made by CDF include the establishment of command, tactical and air to ground freqs. This happens before resources hit the road. Command might be Commands 1 or 2 or one of commands assigned to a large area. These are commands 3-10. I moved away prior to command 12 being added and never heard Command 11 being used. What is assigned depends of the coverage of the repeater the fire is in. In the Sierra foothill region we lived in we listened to Commands 4 & 5. It seems like they like to assign one of these commands before commiting a Command 1 & 2 repeater to an incident, leaving those for the big fires. CDF has been relying on its existing command mountain top repeaters to cover the comms for its overhead/management needs. IIRC this fire or another CDF incident is now using a NIFC command/portable repeater net on a fire where the feds are not in unified command. Late hubby did not leave any notes on this so I'm wondering, is this is a first? I know that CDF using NIFC assigned air ops freqs is really common, but using an all NIFC command net is not. Back in the 1980's late hubby and I ran a river in Idaho. We stopped at NIFC without any prior contact. Some very nice man working there gave us an informal tour of part of the place. We had some short conversations with some people, who showed a lot of dedication. One of my hubby's strong points was being able to talk himself past some barriers to get things done.

P.S. It's hard for me to use "Cal Fire" instead of CDF after living there for 41 years. CDF is faster to type than Cal Fire. GO NATS!!
 
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ErikVanR

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"Cal Fire" is still CDF; actually CDFFP (California Dept of Forestry and Fire Protection). To me, calling CDFFP "Cal Fire" is like referring to Jennifer Lopez as "J-Lo". As for the Healdsburg Fire Dept dispatch, that is performed by REDCOM REDCOM Dispatch in Santa Rosa, CA
154.3100 is the countywide dispatch freq, and Control 2 (155.2650) is the working channel that HFD shares with neighboring depts.
 

zerg901

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"Cal Fire" is still CDF; actually CDFFP (California Dept of Forestry and Fire Protection). To me, calling CDFFP "Cal Fire" is like referring to Jennifer Lopez as "J-Lo". As for the Healdsburg Fire Dept dispatch, that is performed by REDCOM REDCOM Dispatch in Santa Rosa, CA
154.3100 is the countywide dispatch freq, and Control 2 (155.2650) is the working channel that HFD shares with neighboring depts.

Just to doubly confirm - traffic on 151.46 R is just dispatch for approx 10 CalFire stations that are in Sonoma County - and Cloverdale FD? One would expect to hear station paging for CalFire and Cloverdale FD - and initial response (checkback) of those units. Maybe one would also hear CalFire aircraft (and CalFire units from other countys) on 151.46 R when passing thru Sonoma County.

Bottom line - for Sonoma County - to hear all fire dispatches - just 3 channels must be monitored - 154.31 for local goverment - 151.46 R for CalFire & Cloverdale FD - 154.10 for Rohnert Park DPS - right? (plus maybe 1 USCG fire station)
 

ErikVanR

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Yes, 151.4600 is the LNU (Lake/Napa/Sonoma Unit) West repeater output freq that covers mainly the Sonoma Co. area of the unit. 151.3400 is the LNU East freq. that covers the other areas. Both are "St Helena" ECC dispatch. You will often hear larger dispatches simulcasted on West and East, and also dispatched more than once, but on a different repeater location. For REDCOM, only the initial dispatch is put out on 154.3100. Any subsequent traffic will be on a Control channel or Cal Fire channel. REDCOM, St Helena ECC, and RP-DPS are the fire dispatch points for Sonoma Co.
 
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