Does anyone out there know how Statesville Fire Dept paging works? I never hear any tones on the P25 system but then they have come on there and said that you paged the wrong station. If anyone knows how they page out on and where I could possibly listen, would really appreciate it. Thanks
Statesville Fire Paging
- Thread starter drayd48
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They are probably like Charlotte, Concord ,Fayetteville and Winston-Salem
There stations are alerted through MOSCAD which means you will not hear any tones across the P-25 system.
Concord has an old VHF frequency of 154.175 Mhz. however it is mainly used for on scene simplex haz-mat operations.
Charlotte used to back in the early 70's, 80's and 90's had a 5 channel UHF fire channel system and Winston-Salem had a two channel UHF system. Both systems have since been depreciated and no long used.
I know that Charlotte Fire doesn't even have a license anymore for their UHF stuff. Winston Salem still holds a license for their UHF stuff.
The only thing Charlotte Fire uses UHF for is on scene Haz-Mat communications and that frequency was one of the old UHF fire ground channels. There isn't even a licensed anymore.
Since these departments do not rely on volunteers there is no need for them to keep and maintain a VHF or UHF paging system.
Guilford uses 453.750 Mhz. for station alerting of Greensboro Fire Stations also for alerting volunteers as well.
I think you will see in the future that all big city paid fire departments will be alerting this way. Now the cities that rely on volunteers will need to keep a frequency available for alerting volunteers.
Maybe if Marshall reads this he can give you better insight as to how the City of Durham Fire Stations are alerted.
Hope this helps
David
There stations are alerted through MOSCAD which means you will not hear any tones across the P-25 system.
Concord has an old VHF frequency of 154.175 Mhz. however it is mainly used for on scene simplex haz-mat operations.
Charlotte used to back in the early 70's, 80's and 90's had a 5 channel UHF fire channel system and Winston-Salem had a two channel UHF system. Both systems have since been depreciated and no long used.
I know that Charlotte Fire doesn't even have a license anymore for their UHF stuff. Winston Salem still holds a license for their UHF stuff.
The only thing Charlotte Fire uses UHF for is on scene Haz-Mat communications and that frequency was one of the old UHF fire ground channels. There isn't even a licensed anymore.
Since these departments do not rely on volunteers there is no need for them to keep and maintain a VHF or UHF paging system.
Guilford uses 453.750 Mhz. for station alerting of Greensboro Fire Stations also for alerting volunteers as well.
I think you will see in the future that all big city paid fire departments will be alerting this way. Now the cities that rely on volunteers will need to keep a frequency available for alerting volunteers.
Maybe if Marshall reads this he can give you better insight as to how the City of Durham Fire Stations are alerted.
Hope this helps
David
Well I have wandered that but the SFD license for their old VHF channel is gone and it just so happens that they also run on the same channel as MFD dispatch. I have monitored that channel listening to MFD and got no tones or anything for SFD. from my understanding, SFD does not use a CAD system on their trucks and they use EF Johnson radios. This one has just really stumped me. Can you tell me what MOSCAD is? Thanks
MOSCAD is an abbreviation for MOtorola Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition.
Simplest Implementation is a fire station alerting system - When the dispatcher alerts a particular fire station the MOSCAD box activates the station alarm and also sends a signal back to the dispatch console that the station alarm activation was successful.
In our area in the old days the dispatcher would activate a set of pager tones and the Quik Call decoder box at the fire station would activate the station siren and also key the base radio at the same time for a few seconds so the dispatcher received an audible confirmation that the station alarm activation was successful. This worked ok 30 years ago but with the increased number of calls the over the air station playback had to be eliminated.
The MOSCAD system can be setup up on an analog channel but most trunked systems are just integrating the MOSCAD traffic on a dedicated talk group on the system.
Simplest Implementation is a fire station alerting system - When the dispatcher alerts a particular fire station the MOSCAD box activates the station alarm and also sends a signal back to the dispatch console that the station alarm activation was successful.
In our area in the old days the dispatcher would activate a set of pager tones and the Quik Call decoder box at the fire station would activate the station siren and also key the base radio at the same time for a few seconds so the dispatcher received an audible confirmation that the station alarm activation was successful. This worked ok 30 years ago but with the increased number of calls the over the air station playback had to be eliminated.
The MOSCAD system can be setup up on an analog channel but most trunked systems are just integrating the MOSCAD traffic on a dedicated talk group on the system.
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So if I put my scanner in wildcard/freescan mode, would I be able to hear MOSCAD over the designated talkgroup?
I totally agree with Andy.
There are still counties that use the old station feedback method.
I know that McDowell County is set up that way. When the fire tones hit the station automatically keys up and you hear the siren wailing in the background.
Some of the Cabarrus Departments are this way. That is the ones that still have station sirens that work or still used.
I have seen some departments hook up a Minitor II pager and a bell or siren for station alerting as well. There are several different ways that departments can do station alerting without spending money on a costly MOSCAD system.
Albemarle Fire and Lumberton still use the Klaxon System for alerting. All Albemarle Firefighters still carry a monitor pager for receiving calls.
Salisbury Fire uses a system where you can here the station alert tones in the station across the 800 Mhz. radio system. I think they maybe are quick call II tones.
I guess it depends on a departments need and budget as to how they want to be alerted.
David
There are still counties that use the old station feedback method.
I know that McDowell County is set up that way. When the fire tones hit the station automatically keys up and you hear the siren wailing in the background.
Some of the Cabarrus Departments are this way. That is the ones that still have station sirens that work or still used.
I have seen some departments hook up a Minitor II pager and a bell or siren for station alerting as well. There are several different ways that departments can do station alerting without spending money on a costly MOSCAD system.
Albemarle Fire and Lumberton still use the Klaxon System for alerting. All Albemarle Firefighters still carry a monitor pager for receiving calls.
Salisbury Fire uses a system where you can here the station alert tones in the station across the 800 Mhz. radio system. I think they maybe are quick call II tones.
I guess it depends on a departments need and budget as to how they want to be alerted.
David
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CarolinasFeedNet
Member
McDowell County no longer has a playback except for some of the EMS radios
So E-1 was just dispatched on a medical. No tones over both VHF channels (input / output of the old VHF repeater) and heard nothing when I had my scanner in freescan mode. I am going to go and look at some 800 channels for statesville and attempt to put those in my scanner and listen on there.
Station alerting is more than likely done as a call alert to an 800 radio wired into the lights/speakers at the station, a data system transmitted over the trunk system (using the control channel, voice channels are no longer necessary except for a few occasions) or they are wired via fiber back to each station. Statesville has abandoned conventional radios for the FD & PD on a daily operations basis so don't expect to hear much there except during training or system maintenance.
The above information, and a link to this thread, have been added to the MOSCAD RR Wiki page, as an RR Glossary item.
Thanks for sharing.
High Point uses call alert, if the alert when through, we got a red check mark on the Motorola CRT monitor, if it did not go through, we got a red X.
RF-Burns
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I have confirmed that Statesville FD does have a VHF paging frequency that they send tones over. With that said, I looked up their FRN on fcc.gov and there is no such license for paging. There are a few frequencies in the VHF and UHF bands that are currently active licenses and I am currently monitoring them. I will update this thread if I find something out.
NC DOI requires at least two ways to notify a FD of a call. Here in Wake we have voice pagers and Alphanumeric pagers that operate on VHF. Our FD also uses cell phone texts so we have 3 ways, in case one of the other two fails. We have a 800 Alert TG but is is just tone and voice announcement that you have to listen to. It doesn't set off anything.
So confirmed today that the VHF frequency for SFD is 154.130 and DTMF is sent over that to alert the stations. However they go over so fast and there is no voice over the channel that a radio would never be able to pick it up unless in open squelch.
Just heard the tones last night while ECOM and SFD were doing testing. Had to keep my radio in open squelch mode to hear and when the tones went through, the squelch got quiet and there was a faint and small beep I heard. No voice goes over the channel however.
medic611
Member
They may use VHF to open up station lighting, and a separate talk group for voice paging only. This has been done in many other locations. Nothing says that they don't have a phone line PA for voice alerting in each station connected via copper or even VOIP. I've seen that as well in other states.
You are correct about the VHF to set off the stations tones. The tones go off so quick in DTMF and you have to have your radio in open squelch mode to hear them. I did hear them when they were doing pager tests. They then talk over TG 2000 (dispatch channel) on the Statesville Public Safety System.
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