St. Mary's New P25 System Issues

[brian86]

Video of radio not working properly, the county says there is no problem!

Harris P25 Radio Problems - St. Mary's County, Maryland - YouTube

These are the problems that all Public Safety Radio users are coming across in St. Mary's County Maryland. Fire, EMS & Police that require an instant connection to other emergency service responders and communication center officials rely on two way radios.

This video depicts just how bad the system is in St. Mary's County. This video shot at a house fire shows how a fire fighters portable will not allow him to talk to other fire fighters, which could be deadly in an emergency. The county which was told by the radio communications supplier Harris Radio Corporation the county would need around 14 communications towers throughout the county to provide reliable communications to 95% of the counties geographical area. The county director of Public Safety & Information Technology has put public safety officials on a radio system that only provides 6 radio towers with the rest to be added in the next few years.

Public Safety Personnel in St. Mary's County have been reporting issues to the Communications repair division over the last couple of months and get responses such as "We are looking in to it" or "You just need to power off the radio and turn it back on". In an emergency situation Fire Fighters, EMS & Police Officers don't always have time to reset a radio. The system that St. Mary's County has chosen is an 800MHz APCO P25 Phase II Trunked Radio System Installed by Harris Radio Corporation.

The real question is who is responsible when someone dies because of the lack coverage or hardware malfunctions?

 

[DisasterGuy]

How did the EDACS system work in this area?

 

[brian86]

EDACS

The EDACS system was analog so even when reception wasn't the best we could hear what the other person was saying. The radios worked on the edacs system. The New XG75 Radios can't even get logged in to the system.

 

[brian86]

I would have to say that the EDACS System was better reception then we have now

 

[GTR8000]

I really hope you guys are using analog simplex frequencies for fireground operations, and are not relying on a digital trunked system for interior operations. You're asking for trouble if you're using the trunked system for routine fireground ops.

As far as who is responsible if someone gets injured or worse, the answer is "everyone who can be sued will be sued". NFPA 1221 has recommended that fireground ops be conducted using analog simplex for years, and you can be sure that if someone gets hurt or killed on the job, the lawsuits will feature that standard prominently.

If you guys are already using analog simplex for fireground ops, good for you. If not, I cannot stress enough how imperative it is for you to read through NFPA 1221 and follow their recommendations. Get off the trunked system when operating on the fireground and use analog simplex frequencies instead. Clearly the trunked system doesn't have anywhere near the coverage to allow you to operate reliably even while standing outside, much less when conducting interior operations.

 

[DisasterGuy]

I am guessing the EDACS system wasn't using ProVoice... -110dB is all that should be needed to support either P25 or ProVoice.


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[mtnbikebill]

They paid 34 million dollars for this system from Harris and did a switchover from the EDACS system which worked fine.That system only had a few dead spots. Why rush to switch to an untested system? They now have numerous dead spots since they only have less than half the towers up. Everyone involved from the public safety director to the county commissioners and Harris should be held accountable. The first responders risk enough without having unreliable communications.

 

[LDButts]

Could this issue be caused or aggravated by the constant use of crypto to keep all of St Mary's comms encrypted?

 

[fredva]

I understand the aggravation. With only 6 of the recommended 14 towers, it sounds like the system isn't ready for prime-time.

I'm also curious about whether simplex is being used for fireground ops, as Chauffeur6 mentioned.

 

[KevinC]

Video of radio not working properly, the county says there is no problem!

Harris P25 Radio Problems - St. Mary's County, Maryland - YouTube

These are the problems that all Public Safety Radio users are coming across in St. Mary's County Maryland. Fire, EMS & Police that require an instant connection to other emergency service responders and communication center officials rely on two way radios.

This video depicts just how bad the system is in St. Mary's County. This video shot at a house fire shows how a fire fighters portable will not allow him to talk to other fire fighters, which could be deadly in an emergency. The county which was told by the radio communications supplier Harris Radio Corporation the county would need around 14 communications towers throughout the county to provide reliable communications to 95% of the counties geographical area. The county director of Public Safety & Information Technology has put public safety officials on a radio system that only provides 6 radio towers with the rest to be added in the next few years.

Public Safety Personnel in St. Mary's County have been reporting issues to the Communications repair division over the last couple of months and get responses such as "We are looking in to it" or "You just need to power off the radio and turn it back on". In an emergency situation Fire Fighters, EMS & Police Officers don't always have time to reset a radio. The system that St. Mary's County has chosen is an 800MHz APCO P25 Phase II Trunked Radio System Installed by Harris Radio Corporation.

The real question is who is responsible when someone dies because of the lack coverage or hardware malfunctions?

What happened to your video? It's now marked as "Private".

 

[ThePhotoGuy]

Power failure interrupts St. Mary’s emergency radio system

by Jason Babcock Staff writer

The emergency radio frequencies system in St. Mary’s County went down for about 20 minutes on Wednesday morning, affecting communications for police, and fire and rescue services.


Power failure interrupts St. Mary’s emergency radio system -- SoMdNews.com

 

[Patech]

Wednesday’s service interruption was not the fault of the vendor, Harris Corp., said Bob Kelly, director of the St. Mary’s County Department of Emergency Services and Technology.

Oh really!!! This is a joke. All of the equipment for the system came from Harris installed by Harris.

“We had a power supply at the Mechanicsville tower that caused an interruption in communications,” Kelly said. “It’s a power supply that tripped a circuit breaker. It was a hardware failure.”

How does a single site with power supply issue take down a entire system?

The county commissioners have said they may expedite the construction of planned radio towers to improve the system.

More money down the rat hole.

Bob Kelly can't pour enough perfume on this turd!!

 

[DisasterGuy]

Wednesday’s service interruption was not the fault of the vendor, Harris Corp., said Bob Kelly, director of the St. Mary’s County Department of Emergency Services and Technology.

Oh really!!! This is a joke. All of the equipment for the system came from Harris installed by Harris.

“We had a power supply at the Mechanicsville tower that caused an interruption in communications,” Kelly said. “It’s a power supply that tripped a circuit breaker. It was a hardware failure.”

How does a single site with power supply issue take down a entire system?

The county commissioners have said they may expedite the construction of planned radio towers to improve the system.

More money down the rat hole.

Bob Kelly can't pour enough perfume on this turd!!

First let me say that I have no direct experience with the Saint Mary's County system however your post makes it pretty clear that you are experienced neither as a technician or system administrator. A power supply certainly can take down an entire system and in 99% of cases site equipment such as panels, generators and UPSs are in no way under the control of the system manufacturer, supplied by the manufacturer or spec'ed by the manufacturer. What exactly would you like to see money directed at, there is nothing differen't here than there would be under ANY other system of similar spec.

 

[Patech]

How does a power supply that powers a Master V base station not only take out a TX site but, a main and redundant control points?

I have been in the radio technician for 35 years.

What flavor is the Harris Kool-Aid your drinking?

 

[fredva]

The county commissioners have said they may expedite the construction of planned radio towers to improve the system.

More money down the rat hole.

What do you suggest as an alternative?

 

[GTR8000]

How does a power supply that powers a Master V base station not only take out a TX site but, a main and redundant control points?

^ This.

The article stated that a single site failure caused the entire system to fail. If that is true, then this system has some very serious and fatal flaws. No single site failure should ever take an entire system off the air. Anyone who claims otherwise needs to have their knowledge of these systems questioned, not the other way around. :roll:

 

[Patech]

What do you suggest as an alternative?

The County should not go forward with the other sites till Harris corrects the ongoing issues with the system and subscriber equipment.