Vancouver - Portland Fire Mutual Aid Freq or TG?

[oregontreehugger]

Wondering if anyone knows how Vancouver Fire and Portland Fire communicate during a mutual aid incident? Is there a patch between the Clark TRS and Portland TRS, or is there a specific frequency being used?

Was monitoring the large apartment fire in Hazel Dell today via RR streaming and heard a Portland engine come up on the air to run an incident in Vancouver as mutual aid. No idea what frequency or TG they were on.

Thanks in advance...

 

[joescanner]

Portland and Vancouver, while operating on different radio systems under normal circumstances, have the ability to switch systems. The firefighters (and support crew/staff) don't have any idea they're doing so (unless they are really geeky, like me), so no interoperability frequencies are needed. They just show up on the standard talkgroups.

There is allegedly a "hook" programmed into the radios, however, where in the event of a failure of one system, they can switch to one of the other systems (on their own talkgroups), but I haven't been able to confirm that it really exists, or how often or under what circumstances they would actually do that.

 

[oregontreehugger]

Aha, okay, thanks! I was thinking they would maybe be coming up on an 800 MHz national/WA/OR mutual aid channel, but just switching TGs (and thereby switching TRS systems behind the scenes) on the fly makes a lot more practical sense.

 

[joescanner]

Somewhere in this forum, somebody (DickH?) once posted the PFB channel template. Not sure how you'd find it with a search.

When I first started at TriMet, our radios could do 160 channels... The newest radios we have do almost 1,000; and the new ones we're getting in a couple years will handle up to 2,000. Yikes.

 

[DickH]

Aha, okay, thanks! I was thinking they would maybe be coming up on an 800 MHz national/WA/OR mutual aid channel, but just switching TGs (and thereby switching TRS systems behind the scenes) on the fly makes a lot more practical sense.

Portland fire radios have all the important OPS channels for all 4 counties. When a Portland unit is dispatched the dispatcher will usually tell them which talk group to use. For example, when we go to Clackamas it's usually OPS-24 or 25, Lake O. usually 22 or 23. If you have the Clackamas system in your scanner you should be getting the talk group that is OPS-24, etc.
There are no duplicate OPS channels in the 4 counties. I'm not 100% sure of the groupings but these are the OPS channels in our radios:
Portland (Multnomah Co.) 1 to 12
Port of Portland 15 to 19 (never heard them used)
Clackamas Co. 22 to 29
Wash. Co. 32 to 37
Clark Co. 51 to 56 (they used to be 40s)

 

[mjohnston4]

Washington County fire radios are the same, but also have Newberg-Dundee fire channels Ops42 through 45 (I think, maybe higher). Also there is a new template coming out soon and Salem Fire is on it now.

 

[DickH]

Washington County fire radios are the same, but also have Newberg-Dundee fire channels Ops42 through 45 (I think, maybe higher). Also there is a new template coming out soon and Salem Fire is on it now.

Ahhh, so that's who now uses the 40s! Thanks. Please publish the fimal TGs/OPS numbers when you find out.

 

[Dann]

What TG is Portland Fire Dispatched on,Or are they on the same as the county.Thanks

 

[PMJ2kx]

Ahhh, so that's who now uses the 40s! Thanks. Please publish the fimal TGs/OPS numbers when you find out.

Ops42 thru Ops 46 are valid, with Ops42/43 getting the most usage. The DB shows an "Ops41", but that's not a true "ops" channel, and I believe that TG actually is used by Dundee fire. Not sure if it's a training channel, EOC, or whatnot.

ORE007 should know for sure.

 

[mjohnston4]

I just switched over to the bank they are on and we have NB Disp and OPS41-43. I have no clue about talk group numbers.

 

[ORE007]

Ops42 thru Ops 46 are valid, with Ops42/43 getting the most usage. The DB shows an "Ops41", but that's not a true "ops" channel, and I believe that TG actually is used by Dundee fire. Not sure if it's a training channel, EOC, or whatnot.

ORE007 should know for sure.

There is Newberg dispatch and then ops 42 through 47. The ops 41 channels listed is actually ops 47, Joe knows and wil change that soon I believe.

Portland has it's own system and clack and wash county have their own with the smart zone. Newberg is now on the wash county system but before was on their own. The 800 radios have all systems and you just move the knobs and end user does not know they are switching systems. The one thing you cannot do is scan multiple systems on the radios except clack and wash county.

Speaking of Salem, I just heard this week that they are exploring the idea of being part of the clack/wash county system.

 

[DickH]

What TG is Portland Fire Dispatched on,Or are they on the same as the county.Thanks

28944. They dispatch for the whole county, including Gresham, Corbett and Sauvie Island but excluding the airport.

 

[Dann]

Thank you,Any idea how long before they go Digital.

 

[mjohnston4]

There is Newberg dispatch and then ops 42 through 47. The ops 41 channels listed is actually ops 47, Joe knows and wil change that soon I believe.

Portland has it's own system and clack and wash county have their own with the smart zone. Newberg is now on the wash county system but before was on their own. The 800 radios have all systems and you just move the knobs and end user does not know they are switching systems. The one thing you cannot do is scan multiple systems on the radios except clack and wash county.

Speaking of Salem, I just heard this week that they are exploring the idea of being part of the clack/wash county system.

Since Newberg switched over, Washington County still has the old Newberg channels in the radios and not the new. So we cant talk.

 

[ORE007]

That is correct, TVF&R's radios have been flashed, just not western county has not been done yet.

 

[joescanner]

Thank you,Any idea how long before they go Digital.

It's still an unknown how inclusive "going digital" will be. As far as I know it's only the radio techs that have the P25 radios right now. The system architecture was changed, so the 800MHz system is just an analog off-shoot of the P25 system.

I suspect that the first units to make the switch will be the drugs & vice folks, detectives, SERT, etc., so they can regain their encryption capability.

In theory, the talkgroups should map (assuming there's both a P25 and an 800MHz radio affiliated to it), but the talkgroups on the 700MHz system don't have the "same" number (divide the 800MHz talkgroup number by 16 to get the 700MHz talkgroup number; if the 700MHz talkgroup number is greater than 4,095 (65520) then it won't map over).