On Feb 08 2022 the State of Oregon State Interoperability Council along with DAS and other Law Enforcement agencies met. On the agenda was a vote for Oregon to standardize on a new VHF HEMS frequency. HEMS stands for Helicopter Emergency Medical Services and before yesterday we didn't have a dedicated VHF Air to Ground frequency for use in emergencies.
Typically the emergency helo comes up on Fire, or Fire Marshall/State Fire/Mutual aid (which are all the same frequency but confusingly go by three titles depending on who you talk to).
They voted and adopted VMED 29 (155.34750) as the new Oregon HEMS VHF frequency. Washington and Idaho are also adopting the same frequency, so we have a regional three state effort supported by CISA. Oregon has already put in the paperwork and paid the statewide license fee.
To conform with NIFOG it is likely they'll adopt a PL of 156.7. and yes it is 100% VHF analogue with no provision for confusing P25 variants.
It is their aim to have it in place before fire season 2022 which means even though it is probably already in 70% of LE and EMS radio's, it is lost in a never used bank of interoperability channels and additionally there might not be any tone, so it will need to get moved to the active bank and checked for a tone of 156.7
Typically the emergency helo comes up on Fire, or Fire Marshall/State Fire/Mutual aid (which are all the same frequency but confusingly go by three titles depending on who you talk to).
They voted and adopted VMED 29 (155.34750) as the new Oregon HEMS VHF frequency. Washington and Idaho are also adopting the same frequency, so we have a regional three state effort supported by CISA. Oregon has already put in the paperwork and paid the statewide license fee.
To conform with NIFOG it is likely they'll adopt a PL of 156.7. and yes it is 100% VHF analogue with no provision for confusing P25 variants.
It is their aim to have it in place before fire season 2022 which means even though it is probably already in 70% of LE and EMS radio's, it is lost in a never used bank of interoperability channels and additionally there might not be any tone, so it will need to get moved to the active bank and checked for a tone of 156.7
