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.