SBSO "Law Intercom"
- Thread starter jeff2233
- Start date
- Status
There is a Law Intercom and a Fire Intercom, both of which are hardline. No frequency to monitor.
MCIAD
Member
There is also an "intercomm" on the Fire side of things that is Microwave. It is used between South Ops and the various Region/County Coordinator's. We use it all the time to talk to South Ops and CDF San Luis Obispo.
Is this the same fixed point network that used to be called the "South Zone Fire Dispatcher's Network"? It was a UHF/VHF system with the hubs on Santiago on 415.525 (downlink) which was in turn connected to Frazier via 166.5625. From there UHF was used to connect the dispatch centers in the San Joaquin Valley all the way up to Fresno in the days that South Ops ended there (Yosemite and north were in North Ops). The LP had a VHF link from Frazier to Santa Ynez and then on UHF down to the Supervisors Office in Goleta where the dispatch center was located. To connect the Inyo National Forest took a hop from Frazier to Cerro Gordo near Lone Pine on VHF and then up to Silver Peak next to Bishop. The Frazier/Cerro Gordo path was marginal and the radio tech up here eventually worked out a deal to piggy back onto the state's microwave system instead. When you were in range of one of these links the traffic could be very interesting. I was at a meeting in Fresno for a couple of days once and from my motel room during the evenings and mornings listened to the Angeles, San Berdo, Cleveland, and LP coordinating things with each other and South Zone for an intense period of initial attack and some extended attack.
The last few times I've visited LA I've not picked up anything from Santiago. It has been more than five years since I visited and took my portable roof top discone antenna with me and assumed I just could not pick it up with the handheld anymore. Most of my visits in the last five years have either been in the winter or in a fall with little fire activity and this could be another reason I don't hear anything. However if it has been moved off VHF/UHF entirely to microwave I would not be able to hear regardless of fire activity and antenna. The Forest Service built this system originally and they are not real hot on microwave these days except where they can piggy back without maintaining microwave themselves. Some Forests have put some of their links back on UHF because the power costs for microwave have become an issue and UHF links work fairly well using solar.
Do you know if it is now only on microwave? If you or anyone else can shed some light on the current situation with this I would be most thankful. It used to be listening to 415.525 was interesting and fairly easy as Santiago provides such good coverage to a wide area of southern California. It was a frequency wildland fire buffs all knew about. On a couple of fire assignments I actually picked up reassignments of my crew hours before we were informed at an incident or while sitting in staging because I heard a Forest dispatcher talking about us with South Ops. This was particularly useful considering we were laying on the lawn of some high school athletic field for two days waiting to either go home or get sent to another fire. Talk about a boring experience. When I got some information no one else had I got real popular very quickly!
The last few times I've visited LA I've not picked up anything from Santiago. It has been more than five years since I visited and took my portable roof top discone antenna with me and assumed I just could not pick it up with the handheld anymore. Most of my visits in the last five years have either been in the winter or in a fall with little fire activity and this could be another reason I don't hear anything. However if it has been moved off VHF/UHF entirely to microwave I would not be able to hear regardless of fire activity and antenna. The Forest Service built this system originally and they are not real hot on microwave these days except where they can piggy back without maintaining microwave themselves. Some Forests have put some of their links back on UHF because the power costs for microwave have become an issue and UHF links work fairly well using solar.
Do you know if it is now only on microwave? If you or anyone else can shed some light on the current situation with this I would be most thankful. It used to be listening to 415.525 was interesting and fairly easy as Santiago provides such good coverage to a wide area of southern California. It was a frequency wildland fire buffs all knew about. On a couple of fire assignments I actually picked up reassignments of my crew hours before we were informed at an incident or while sitting in staging because I heard a Forest dispatcher talking about us with South Ops. This was particularly useful considering we were laying on the lawn of some high school athletic field for two days waiting to either go home or get sent to another fire. Talk about a boring experience. When I got some information no one else had I got real popular very quickly!
Last edited:
Many years ago there was a system called "CLERS" or the California Law Enforcement Radio System which linked 22 mountain top "two way radio stations" and 12 microwave only points using the state's microwave backbone system. The "two way radio stations" used 8 frequency pairs and these stations could be used in two ways, one as just a microwave access point, and two as a mobile relay or repeater in more common language. This allowed different law enforcement agencies the ability to access the system using only a relatively low cost VHF radio and antenna instead of linking into the State's microwave system. Using DTMF tones each user could control the system and open up circuits to a specific agency or to a group of agencies by using DTMF tones and a list of numbers for each agency. Example, the Riverside P.D. could use a VHF radio to access the microwave link at Snow Peak and open up a circuit to all of the agencies in L.A. County or to OES in Sacramento only.
Snow Peak, located on the San Bernardino National Forest and northeast of Banning, used 155.790 output or downlink and 155.430 uplink or input. Snow Peak was linked to downtown L.A. via microwave and then to Sacramento and the rest of the state. Many frequency guides used to list the 8 frequency pairs and label them "law enforcement mutual aid" along with the mountaintop they were located on. So I'm not giving out some secret information I was privy to at one time.
In the last 5-10 years I heard some traffic on this system from the Government Peak site. In my area the system is entirely on the State's microwave system so I can't vouch for the currency of the information I've presented here.
It is worth a try putting the frequencies for Snow Peak into your scanner and finding out if they work. If it isn't being used in the repeater mode you can try the input frequency and if you are close enough to a base station, will hear both sides of the conversation. For folks in the LA area Mt Lukens uses the same frequency pair. I would love to hear from anyone who tries these frequencies. When I have more time I should look and see if these frequencies are still licensed to the State of California.
Snow Peak, located on the San Bernardino National Forest and northeast of Banning, used 155.790 output or downlink and 155.430 uplink or input. Snow Peak was linked to downtown L.A. via microwave and then to Sacramento and the rest of the state. Many frequency guides used to list the 8 frequency pairs and label them "law enforcement mutual aid" along with the mountaintop they were located on. So I'm not giving out some secret information I was privy to at one time.
In the last 5-10 years I heard some traffic on this system from the Government Peak site. In my area the system is entirely on the State's microwave system so I can't vouch for the currency of the information I've presented here.
It is worth a try putting the frequencies for Snow Peak into your scanner and finding out if they work. If it isn't being used in the repeater mode you can try the input frequency and if you are close enough to a base station, will hear both sides of the conversation. For folks in the LA area Mt Lukens uses the same frequency pair. I would love to hear from anyone who tries these frequencies. When I have more time I should look and see if these frequencies are still licensed to the State of California.
- Joined
- Dec 19, 2002
- Messages
- 785
CLERS is still alive, well, and very very minimally used.
Every now and again I'll have a scanner on at the right time to hear the test (can't recall if it's weekly or monthly) from OES HQ in Sacto on my local CLERS channel (453.675 here in SLO County).
Every now and again I'll have a scanner on at the right time to hear the test (can't recall if it's weekly or monthly) from OES HQ in Sacto on my local CLERS channel (453.675 here in SLO County).
There is another network as well. The South Ops net is primarily used for wildland fire and is maintained by the federal government. The other network is used for all fire, not just wildland, and it is maintained by the state for OES. It is somewhat similar to the CLERS system and uses the output frequencies of 154.160 and 154.220. This is an interesting system as they used mobile relays or repeaters with VHF high outputs and VHF low inputs at one time. OES engines, operated by local fire departments, could often be seen traveling in groups (strike teams) on highways with both VHF high and VHF low whips. This VHF low feature was to be phased out and replaced with 159 MHz repeater inputs. In the last five years I've heard OES query fire agencies in southern Calif. in some sort of daily or weekly check in procedure.
I try to stay on my side of the Sierras and not go south more often than I have to, so my knowledge of the three systems in these three posts is limited. In addition, the information that used to cross my desk is not available anymore since I retired. I hope someone who lives in southern Calif. will put these frequencies into their radios and share the results with the rest of us.
These nets are the type where they don't seem important during relatively calm periods. During large disasters such as the fire season of 2003 in southern Calif. or a riot like the 1992 post Rodney King trial riots, their importance increases. Then there are those times with widespread phone or power systems outages such as during the Northridge 1994 earthquake. These systems are designed for such events and it is best to know about them before a large incident. Another set of frequencies to get your hands on for such events are in the HF band. When an event causes the microwave system problems such as dishes not being aligned to the next site, and it goes down, HF radio is one of the backup systems available.
As is often said in ham radio circles, when everything else fails, microwave, phone lines (microwave paths, fiber optic, seafloor cables, and satellites), cell and satellite phones, HF will get through. When I first started my career with the U.S. Forest Service in the 70's there was little evidence of interest in HF, but there was a resurgence that began in the mid 80's in having it available. That said the greatest number of HF radios in existence and people who know how to operate them is in ham radio. Many agencies rely on hams to use these radios on a periodic basis to make sure the networks operate correctly. Caltrans in Bishop relies on hams in the Bishop Amateur Radio Club to participate in a weekly HF net check in to make sure everything works before "the big one" hits.
I try to stay on my side of the Sierras and not go south more often than I have to, so my knowledge of the three systems in these three posts is limited. In addition, the information that used to cross my desk is not available anymore since I retired. I hope someone who lives in southern Calif. will put these frequencies into their radios and share the results with the rest of us.
These nets are the type where they don't seem important during relatively calm periods. During large disasters such as the fire season of 2003 in southern Calif. or a riot like the 1992 post Rodney King trial riots, their importance increases. Then there are those times with widespread phone or power systems outages such as during the Northridge 1994 earthquake. These systems are designed for such events and it is best to know about them before a large incident. Another set of frequencies to get your hands on for such events are in the HF band. When an event causes the microwave system problems such as dishes not being aligned to the next site, and it goes down, HF radio is one of the backup systems available.
As is often said in ham radio circles, when everything else fails, microwave, phone lines (microwave paths, fiber optic, seafloor cables, and satellites), cell and satellite phones, HF will get through. When I first started my career with the U.S. Forest Service in the 70's there was little evidence of interest in HF, but there was a resurgence that began in the mid 80's in having it available. That said the greatest number of HF radios in existence and people who know how to operate them is in ham radio. Many agencies rely on hams to use these radios on a periodic basis to make sure the networks operate correctly. Caltrans in Bishop relies on hams in the Bishop Amateur Radio Club to participate in a weekly HF net check in to make sure everything works before "the big one" hits.
Last edited:
I believe most of the South Ops comms are via the intercom system, whether that is still microwave or via Telco or high-speed data lines. Last I heard, IIRC, was that there was 1 tanker base that was still using the regular RF network. Can anyone else confirm this?
MCIAD
Member
As far as I know (and I learn just how little that is everyday), our Comms with South Ops is Microwave only. There are no VHF or UHF links into the "intercomm" that I have seen in the last 7 years.
As far as the OES sysem goes, it is a VHF system, but I do not have the freqs with me right now. It wouldn't make much difference anyhow for most of you. We have a remote set up in our center for OES 1 and OES 2 - and I have never heard anything on them - ever. I just checked with a contact at OES a few months ago, and was told it was still a valid sustem, just *very* rarely used.
As far as the OES sysem goes, it is a VHF system, but I do not have the freqs with me right now. It wouldn't make much difference anyhow for most of you. We have a remote set up in our center for OES 1 and OES 2 - and I have never heard anything on them - ever. I just checked with a contact at OES a few months ago, and was told it was still a valid sustem, just *very* rarely used.
MCIAD said:
Then it is confirmed that your dispatch center links to "South Ops" via microwave. What hasn't been confirmed yet is if the 166 MHz/415 MHz is completely off the air, right? Or do you have information that indicates it is not on the air?
Are we talking about the same network? The one I'm familiar with is a point to point with all the wildland fire agencies in South Operations - California, one of the Geographical Area Coordination Centers for wildland fire. Examples of traffic I've heard are "San Berdo, Angeles, respond Engine 33 out of Mormon Rocks to a fire on the Angeles Crest Highway, 3 miles west of Big Pines"; "South Ops, Los Padres, we have committed Helicopter 527 and the LP shots to an incident on the Santa Barbara District"; "Cleveland, South Ops, launch Tanker 131 for a Ventura county incident southeast of Ojai, stand by for lat/long"; and "Sierra, Yosemite, is your Batterson engine available for a new start south of Wawona inside the park?"
The feds were given direction to move all links and point to point networks off VHF High. I hadn't heard if the 166 MHz frequencies were replaced with 415's. Maybe this is because the net was moved to microwave only, or because I'm retired and not in a position to hear the latest anymore. The North Ops network moved the whole thing to VHF low in response to the same directive. I'm not in a location to hear either net often enough to keep up to date on their status.
Last edited:
MCIAD said:
Don't they still do a weekly radio check on this system with all the operational areas? I thought I heard it a couple of weeks ago. It sounds like this is more of a backup system anymore.
MCIAD
Member
I can not say one way or another if there is s VHF link into the system, only that we (Ventura Co. Fire Comm. Center) do not have any other way to call South Os (other than the phone). And it is used as you describe it - South Ops calling the Air Bases, San Bernardino calling Perris for Mutual Aid, etc. It can be very busy during the day, on and off season. At night, it is mostly used for Mutual Aid requests between Riverside Co. (Perris) and San Brdo or Orange Co., etc.
I will make a call or two tomorrow at work and see about the VHF stuff. Hope to have an answer in a day or two.
I will make a call or two tomorrow at work and see about the VHF stuff. Hope to have an answer in a day or two.
The federal intercom is the one you can monitor. The state intercom is microwave. Not monitorable.
The system the poster was initially asking about is an intercom set up by San Bernardino County that links fire and law comm centers in San Bernardino County as well as some in Riverside Co. It is often used to relay incidents, eta's, updates, etc. It is a hardwire system.
San Bernardino County Comm Center does not have access to the state or federal intercom system that has been mentioned in this thread. They do have access to the OES system.
The system the poster was initially asking about is an intercom set up by San Bernardino County that links fire and law comm centers in San Bernardino County as well as some in Riverside Co. It is often used to relay incidents, eta's, updates, etc. It is a hardwire system.
San Bernardino County Comm Center does not have access to the state or federal intercom system that has been mentioned in this thread. They do have access to the OES system.
Just for clarification the federal intercom is on frequencies allocated to the federal government and was built and is maintained by the Forest Service, but I would bet they get help from BLM, NPS, and CA State radio techs, considering there are links to those agencies dispatch centers. I never knew that Ventura County was linked in which leads me to believe all the other southern CA "contract counties" are as well. They include Kern, Santa Barbara, Ventura, LA, and Orange Counties. For those of you that aren't familiar with contract counties in a wildland fire context in California, they are counties who have countywide fire departments and provide fire prevention and suppression for the State Responsibility Area (SRA) lands within that county. SRA lands are normally the responsibility of CDF but in these and at least one northern CA county (Marin) the state pays the counties to provide these services. The more urbanized counties with SRA lands tend to have more fire services than the rural counties and it makes sense for counties to provide these services as the SRA lands are intermixed with and may have some development on them.
In the less urbanized counties this situation is handled differently and counties contract for CDF to provide structural protection and other services for areas that don't have a county fire department or have a local volunteer department. CDF has over 140 agreements with local governments and fire districts to provide dispatching, command, training, up to providing a full local type fire department with ladder trucks, Type I and II engines, and medical services. It is an interesting situation. In counties like San Luis Obispo, San Bernardino, and Riverside the county fire departments and CDF are essentially merged, but I can't describe the relationships there as it has been a couple of years since I read about them.
This information is presented not for disp10 and MICIAD as they know this stuff better than I, but for other readers that don't know as much about the fire management infastructure in California. It is the best and most developed fire management system in the world, with more uban/rural interface and a greater history of major wildland conflagration than anywhere in the world. Only the eastern portion of Australia comes close, although some areas in Colorado are beginning to have more large interface fires in the last 15 or so years. From the California fire management system came ICS. The effort to develop it was begun as a result of the disasterous 1970 California fire season by the Congress. The effort was called "FIRESCOPE" which stood for FIre fighting REsorces in Southern California Organized for Potential Emergencies. With the U.S. Forest Service designated the lead agency by Congress it included CDF and the LA, Ventura, and possibly some other counties I've forgotten now (my apologies to them if I have not included them). It now stands for FIre fighting RESources in California Organized for Potential Emergencies and provides a coordination function. We now know that ICS is being used nationwide for all emergencies, not just fire, and is used by even the smallest organizations. I could write quite a bit more about ICS and my personal observations of its developement and how it works.
I also had the privilege to work with the person in charge of the FIRESCOPE program at its inception for about a month while he prepared a contingency plan for volcanic/seismic disasters for all the eastern Sierra agencies. Just a side note, he transferred to the Gifford Pinchot National Forest in 1979 to get away from the stress of southern California where he had spent his entire career in fire management. After coordinating the development of ICS he felt it was time to live without the heavy demands he had been under for so long. He thought he could slow down in his last years before retirement. We all know that shortly after he arrived he found himself managing the actiivty when Mt St. Helens awoke. With his experience and with the Forest Service having access to more resources, combined with the lack of same for the State of Washington and local agenices, he became the overall manager of the entire situation sort of by default. His stores about it and the southern CA situation before, during, and after the development of ICS were fascinating. The agencies in Washington have come a long way since and if Mt. Saint Helens or any other Cascade volcano there does the same, the situation will be different.
That would be great! Any information you are able to get and provide without compromising your position would be most appreciated. My sources for the most part are gone now that I have retired as most of the people I worked with that had radio knowledge are now retired too.
In the less urbanized counties this situation is handled differently and counties contract for CDF to provide structural protection and other services for areas that don't have a county fire department or have a local volunteer department. CDF has over 140 agreements with local governments and fire districts to provide dispatching, command, training, up to providing a full local type fire department with ladder trucks, Type I and II engines, and medical services. It is an interesting situation. In counties like San Luis Obispo, San Bernardino, and Riverside the county fire departments and CDF are essentially merged, but I can't describe the relationships there as it has been a couple of years since I read about them.
This information is presented not for disp10 and MICIAD as they know this stuff better than I, but for other readers that don't know as much about the fire management infastructure in California. It is the best and most developed fire management system in the world, with more uban/rural interface and a greater history of major wildland conflagration than anywhere in the world. Only the eastern portion of Australia comes close, although some areas in Colorado are beginning to have more large interface fires in the last 15 or so years. From the California fire management system came ICS. The effort to develop it was begun as a result of the disasterous 1970 California fire season by the Congress. The effort was called "FIRESCOPE" which stood for FIre fighting REsorces in Southern California Organized for Potential Emergencies. With the U.S. Forest Service designated the lead agency by Congress it included CDF and the LA, Ventura, and possibly some other counties I've forgotten now (my apologies to them if I have not included them). It now stands for FIre fighting RESources in California Organized for Potential Emergencies and provides a coordination function. We now know that ICS is being used nationwide for all emergencies, not just fire, and is used by even the smallest organizations. I could write quite a bit more about ICS and my personal observations of its developement and how it works.
I also had the privilege to work with the person in charge of the FIRESCOPE program at its inception for about a month while he prepared a contingency plan for volcanic/seismic disasters for all the eastern Sierra agencies. Just a side note, he transferred to the Gifford Pinchot National Forest in 1979 to get away from the stress of southern California where he had spent his entire career in fire management. After coordinating the development of ICS he felt it was time to live without the heavy demands he had been under for so long. He thought he could slow down in his last years before retirement. We all know that shortly after he arrived he found himself managing the actiivty when Mt St. Helens awoke. With his experience and with the Forest Service having access to more resources, combined with the lack of same for the State of Washington and local agenices, he became the overall manager of the entire situation sort of by default. His stores about it and the southern CA situation before, during, and after the development of ICS were fascinating. The agencies in Washington have come a long way since and if Mt. Saint Helens or any other Cascade volcano there does the same, the situation will be different.
MCIAD said:
That would be great! Any information you are able to get and provide without compromising your position would be most appreciated. My sources for the most part are gone now that I have retired as most of the people I worked with that had radio knowledge are now retired too.
MCIAD
Member
Just a quick note - I have calls into a couple of folks to clarify the systems, but have as yet not received any returns. I just didn't want anyone to think I had forgotten.
I heard "South OPS" traffic, I believe it was last year (I don't get south much), off of Frazier Mtn. The repeater output is 164.9125, I have confirmed this. In the north valley "North OPS" can be heard off St. John on 41.790.
You can definitely hear the South Ops, and I assume the North Ops, federal intercom system with a scanner. Just not the state intercom.
If I recall correctly, the state side also had an A and B intercom. 1 was primarily the Region 4 units, 1 was the Region 3 units.
If I recall correctly, the state side also had an A and B intercom. 1 was primarily the Region 4 units, 1 was the Region 3 units.
northzone said:
Frazier transmits on 164.9125 to Santa Ynez and Santiago and used to transmit to Cerro Gordo when the Inyo used a combination of UHF and VHF to link to South Ops. These sites all transmit to Frazier on 166.5625. Everything else is on UHF. As far as I know the downlinks all repeat the uplinks so if you are in range of 164.9125 or 415.525 you hear all the traffic on this network.
Interesting situation considering the following directive in the Forest Service Telecommunications Handbook:
41.11 - Fixed and Mobile Service. Use bands 30-50 MHz, 162-174 MHz, and
406-420 MHz for Frequency Modulated (FM) mobile radio service. Do not
use frequencies in the band 162-174 MHz exclusively for fixed point-to-
point assignments. Because of the heavy land-mobile use of the 406-420
MHz band, assignments for fixed point-to-point operations are becoming
hard to justify and obtain. Therefore, it is recommended that units
requiring new or expanded point-to-point operations consider other
bands/alternatives prior to requesting assignments. Repeater pair
frequencies should be assigned with the highest frequency of the pair as
the repeater transmit frequency.
(Higlighting added by me)
This is why the north ops net went all low band, among some other reasons. There must be some sort of problem using low band in southern California that doesn't exist in northern California.
I'm beginning to understand that the "federal system" which has CDF in it also might be one network and that the A and B intercom systems on the state microwave system are most likely separate systems. I've never heard a county on the federal system, but then I've not been able to monitor the federal system that much. The A and B system use sound like one is for the Sierra Area (Old Region 4) and the other for the South Area (Old Region 3) of the Sierra-South Region or Southern Region, if I have the current organizational terms correct as now used by CDF. Ventura County's link is likely into the A or B system and sounds like it doesn't include the traffic on the federal system. I hope MCIAD can clarify this.
I remember when CDF had six regions, then it became five, and finally now two, with two "areas" in each region. When they did so, they changed lines in the area north of Yosemite and as a result Yosemite Natiional Park and the Stansislaus National Forest, formally in "North Zone" were brought into "South Ops". The line isn't clean however, as the Amado-Eldorado Ranger Unit (now called "Operational Units") is in South Ops while the Eldorado National Forest is in North Ops. That must cause a bit of confusion at times when a fire occurs right at the boundary of CDF AEU SRA lands and Eldorado NF lands. I guess the "Camino" emergency communications center would have both a North Ops network radio and a South Ops network radio. With each in a different Geographical Area Coordination Center it is good they are in the same dispatch center.
In the eastern Sierra there is a microwave linked intercom system called the "Hotline". I don't have access to it at home obviously, but have heard it in the background when the agencies are transmitting on their respective radio systems. I've also listened to it when I've been in the Inyo NF/BLM interagency dispatch center in Bishop. It has all the PD/County Sheriff/CHP/Caltrans dispatch centers on it, as well as the Federal Interagency center for the Inyo NF/BLM and CDF in San Bernardino. Too bad we can't monitor it!
This thread has been very informative for me. I like to know about and program the frequencies for these point to point networks in my scanners. As I said in a previous post, some of them may not be used heavily during "normal" circumstances, but if phone and microwave lines go down or are overloaded, the situation will likely be different.
PeterSz
Member
- Joined
- Sep 11, 2004
- Messages
- 58
If you can find the "California Mobilization Guide" online, look for info about the "Dispatch Net". Use of the "Dispatch Net" is limited to requests for 'initial attack forces' IRC. Requests for 'extended attack forces' are communicated via other means.
("Dispatch Net" is the 164 Mhz / 166 Mhz / 400 Mhz radio system that is mentioned in the previous posts.)
Peter Sz - Arlington MA
("Dispatch Net" is the 164 Mhz / 166 Mhz / 400 Mhz radio system that is mentioned in the previous posts.)
Peter Sz - Arlington MA
- Status
