USFS Region 5 Fire Dispatch Frequencies

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Kirk

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Los Padres National Forest: 170.550 MHz
 

RobertW1

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EMSJUNKY said:
Does anyone have the local net frequencies for USFS Region 5 fire units?

Thanks

Each Forest has its own radio operations and local "net" frequencies. Which Forest are you talking about?
 

SCPD

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ScannerDude244 said:
I think he means local "in his area" I always hear CDF units say local net tone 5 or what ever tone they are on.

Well now, you must know that CDF and the Forest Service are two different agencies at two different levels of government. On fires CDF sleeps in motels and us USFS grunts sleep on the ground. CDF gets paid portal to portal or for every hour they are gone from their home unit, even if that was during 1988 at Yellowstone when I was there along with a few CDF folks for 5 weeks on those historic fires. They don't get paid overtime or receive a hazard differential like the USFS people, but usually make more money than we do. I could be wrong about the overtime, pardon me, I've been retired and in my second career for awhile now. CDF calls their dispatch nets local nets and the Forest Service has Forest Net, Admin Net, and Service Net. Region 5 in the wildland fire setting usually refers to the Forest Service's administrative region which covers almost all National Forest land in California and is actually called the "Pacific Southwest Region" and is one of nine USFS regions around the U.S. numbered 1 to 10 just to confuse everyone. Region 7 was the old Midwest Region and was absorbed into the Eastern Region in the late 50's. When I used to tell someone in the USFS that they were really performing badly, I would tell them "you are really bucking for a promotion to Region 7."

In order to answer this persons question I need to know what Forests he is interested in and if he means the USFS or CDF.
 

northzone

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To answer your question:
Just go one forum below this to "It's fire season", download the CDF 2006 radio plan and you will find the USFS fire nets for all the national forests in region 5 (along with all the CDF frequencies and a host of other stuff).
 

scankid2591

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Which forests and/or parks does "Region 5" cover? (I'm programming in the entire CDF Radio Plan right now so I was just wondering)
 

echo174

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Hello all starting out a with a few good ideas first thing to do if you know a fire is in your listenng area is to program all the forest serv.ch. then after you do that put your scanner in search mode 150-174 ive been a wildland firefighter for 15 years mostly with contract crew from oregon i live in arkansas and fly out to what fire they want me to be on.talking about over time contract crews get over time.i know the forest sev, and cdf dont get paid that good ive been all over california and worked with cdf and i dont remember any of us sleeping in hotels always at base camp.the only thing that some people dont know is contract crew owners get paid 24 dollars an hour for each crew member and the owner pays the crew person 8 to 10.00 an hour now do the math and compare that to a forest serv.and a cdf member see who gets payed more.i know ive stayed on a mtn top for 3 days getting payed for doing nothing and the tax payers are geting riped off every year.we have to much safety in fighting fires and to me alot of the rules suck because there broken every day in 2002 in south fork colorado they wanted us to protect a road and before we could do anything we got over ran by fire our crew boss was listening to the div.supervisor and not looking at what was going on when it was to late after 3 hours of eating smoke i found out the div.supervisor we had was a trainee i asked him were his boss was he was at base camp what a great idea a trainee by himself its like having bush in iraq leading the troops.i was wondering after that point why set safety when there broken every year.im just waiting here in the next week or two ill be on another fire.one thing to do is listen to tac channels youll never know what youll hear we cant talk to much on the repeaters about the fire we keep that on tac or cell phone.so if you guys want more info just ask lol
 

SCPD

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My reference to who stays in motels and who sleeps on the ground was meant mostly in jest. It does have some basis in practiice though. CDF and the federal agencies like to rib each other using the differences between agencies that individual employees have no control or much influence over. Lately, the change in uniform from khaki to navy blue by CDF is the source of lots of ribbing, as CDF people are located lower in elevation than U.S. Forest Service people and are in hotter enviroments where a dark color seems a bit unpractical at times.

I won't comment on the remainder of what I think you are saying in your post. Just realize that there is a lot of cheap talk going on at the lower levels of an organization. This cheap talk may, and in most cases may not, have anything to do with reality. It is usually the result of the observations of inexperienced people who like to fill in the large gaps in their knowledge with some stories that don't link cause and effect very well.

Also remember that contractors are there for one reason and that is to make a profit. You won't find the same levels of dedication and commitiment among their ranks as you do with full time agency people. The more dedication and commitment the more it costs to keep people. The dedication and commitment required are more than most people can see or appreciate until they are in those people's shoes.
 

echo174

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o your right about cdf and forest serv.they do have 2 diffrent ways of fighting fires your some what right about contract crews the one i work for he wants people that dont do it for the money its all about the fun of the fire we want people that want to learn how fire lives if they just want the money then there not going to learn nothing lot of the forest service people started with contract crews and they use us as recruts. the one thing is contract crews will go on more fires then a person that works in a dist. see each one of us forest service and state forest have to go on a big fire 1 time in five years just to keep our red card and every year we have to take our resert test and pack test there is alot of work involved each year.but what im starting to figure out is oregon and nevada will be programing all narow band freq. that cdf has in there radios but that wont happen till next summer im wondering if cdf is taking the big jump that all west of the rockies have to have all the same freq.it would be a great idea and cheaper on all of us i know forest service has there own nation wide freq but were realy not useing them any more were useing more of the state forest or local fire channels.depends what state were in put if cdf is going to take over like rumars are saying then theres going to be less headace
 

BirkenVogt

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CDF will not change what they do for anyone or anything. They will be going narrowband soon but they move extremely slowly because of lack of money. What they will do will be to stuff new frequencies in between their existing frequencies on narrowband.

Birken
 
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