Waterbury Encrypted?

[WoodburyMan]

Unable to hear anything on Waterbury tonight.

My SDS100/200 gets a constant lock on the P25 control channel 852.175 MHz at -100db, but doesn't see the "P25" or "Data" light up.

Ran DSD+ and I keep getting "muting encrypted voice" messages but not displaying any TG info. I'm getting a lot of "unknown/invalid DUID: 11" messages, TG11 is their primary dispatch TG. I also get 4 and 2 which as far as I know aren't TG's they have. I get a lot of "unrecoverable NID" as well. Once in a great while I will get the Fire PD giving a call, but it;s definitely acting strange. Eventually after sitting for 10-15 minutes I'll get Site and System ID's and it will confirm control frequencies and such. Then it will lose it and freak out tuning to all other frequencies. Unitrunker won't pick up anything... in SDR# I get a 23db SNR

I just listened a few days ago no problem. I updated the CC on the database about a month ago too since it was out of date by 2 years and they changed it since then. I've also scanned through all frequencies... nothing else.

Wonder if it's something for just July 4th or permanent? Checking with some contacts I have there...

 

[WoodburyMan]

DSD+ and SDR# screenshots

 

[WoodburyMan]

For some reason lots of "Radio Inhibit" things keep appearing. I never remember seeing anything like that before.

 

[Auburn36801]

Inhibit means the radio has been disabled on that talk group.

 

[GTR8000]

Inhibit means that the talk group is encrypted .

No, it doesn't. Inhibit means that the system is sending out "stun" commands to disable radios. Has nothing to do with encryption.

 

[doctordialtone]

Inhibit means the radio has been disabled

"stun" commands to disable radios.

I don't see a difference...

 

[GTR8000]

I don't see a difference...

@Auburn36801 edited his post after I corrected him. Look at the quote of his original post when I replied to him.

 

[WoodburyMan]

That's so strange since those are Talk Groups that aren't used and I've never picked up on before. And I never usually see lots of those. And even an encrypted system would show NAC ID or System ID, and Talkgroups, no? Just garbled audio... so strange.

My contact at WPD is back on duty tomorrow evening and will figure out what's going on or happened. They said they have some encrypted channels/talkgroups so it makes no sense for the whole thing to go encrypted. Let alone to switch in the afternoon on a busy holiday.

It's strange. I heard some activity around 5pm. State listed a car that hit a pedestrian in Wolcott, fled to Wolcott Ave in Waterbury, then I heard Waterbury PD give some calls out about it, then the system went silent.

 

[GTR8000]

Those inhibit messages are not talkgroups, they are subscriber IDs (radios).

 

[WoodburyMan]

Okay this is where it gets strange.
I go to one of the ACC channels. NAC matches and everything. I get this:


There's TWO sites listed as neighbors. Waterbury has never had more than one site. And they're 500 MHz, not 800mhz. These two frequencies appear NO WHERE on the FCC search.

Then tuning to those frequencies... I got these...
I heard some calls on it, however the signal is VERY VERY weak, and my HAM atennas I have are only tuned up to 480mhz at the highest. Getting 500mhz is tough.

  Network: BEE00.1AE

  Bandplan #0:   Base=851.00625   Offset=-45     Spacing=6.25  BW=12.5
  Bandplan #1:   Base=762.00625   Offset=+30     Spacing=6.25  BW=12.5
  Bandplan #2:   Base=500.        Offset=+3      Spacing=6.25  BW=12.5
  Bandplan #3:   Base=762.00625   Offset=+30     Spacing=12.5  BW=12.5  Slots=2
  Bandplan #4:   Base=500.2875    Offset=+4.9125  Spacing=6.25  BW=12.5


    Site: 1.1

    Channel 2-452:    502.825      CC


    Site: 1.2    NAC=1A0

    Neighbor: BEE00.1AE-1.1
    Neighbor: BEE00.1AE-1.3

    Channel 2-72:     500.45                VOICE
    Channel 2-168:    501.05       CC
    Channel 2-180:    501.125          SCC
    Channel 2-272:    501.7                 VOICE
    Channel 2-384:    502.4            SCC


    Site: 1.3    NAC=1A3

    Neighbor: BEE00.1AE-1.1
    Neighbor: BEE00.1AE-1.2

    Channel 0-29:     851.1875     CC
    Channel 0-53:     851.3375         SCC
    Channel 0-93:     851.5875         SCC
    Channel 0-99:     851.625          SCC

Did Waterbury just switch to a 500mhz????
Everything I know of moved to 800mhz and 700mhz, 500 seems... backwards? Especially in terms of interop.

 

[GTR8000]

Uh, 1AE is Nassau County's P25 system.

https://www.radioreference.com/apps/db/?action=sysid&sysid=1AE

 

[WoodburyMan]

Uh, 1AE is Nassau County's P25 system.

https://www.radioreference.com/apps/db/?action=sysid&sysid=1AE

Whoa. Okay. I didn't bother checking out of state FCC entries because I usually can't pick ANYTHING up out of state from my location. That's some incredible ducting going on. That's absolutely amazing. 50mi straight line across the sounds for me on 800mhz. I can get Waterbury at that frequency 15mi away let alone from across the sound.

 

[WoodburyMan]

I got a few random hits on TG11 (Dispatch 1 / "Channel 1") with good voice.
Then they disappeared again. Then they come back.

The numbers on the disallows are Radio ID's, not Talk Groups based on some registration requests I saw accepted. So this is a lot of radios trying to register with the system but are being denied.


In the main log as well I'm getting TONS of CRC errors, even though I'm getting 20-30db SNR. This plus all the weird Talk Group Inhibits makes me think something is up. I no longer see the encryption marks, I turned "e" option off. I think there's just a signal problem like one of their repeater simulcast sites is down (They have 2) and DSD was confusing the bad packets with encryption. Things are slowly getting better maybe as they are working on the system?

 

[WoodburyMan]

Definitely an issue with a Simulcast site.

3am I could start to hear stations again and less CRC errors where my SDS100/200 could get locks again sometimes. There's still some issues. Dips in and out. Carrier of some sort seems to be there the entire time, but watching the logs, the CRC errors and when the SDS100/200 lose data locks coincide. Signal issue for sure. I'll be a few blocks over from one of the sites tomorrow. See how it works with a closer location.

 

[msingewald]

Are you monitoring the CSERN system? I have been noticing some towns testing that system, any chance they are?

 

[WoodburyMan]

Are you monitoring the CSERN system? I have been noticing some towns testing that system, any chance they are?

Yeah I do. I was monitoring all 3 sites I can hit from here yesterday as well. Troop I and A get tons of Waterbury CTT traffic on it and new new TG's. If Waterbury PD was on it it would be noticeable per how many conversations they have. Although its a candidate. They have a 800mhz P25 Phase I system. They could roll or patch into CSERN relatively cheaply.

This morning still intermittent. Better than last night. Still 20-30db SNR but its like the signal pulses on and off with data. Like the carrier is constantly TX'ing but the data being fed to it is intermittent on just the CC. Cause these CRC errors. If my scanners or DSD+ can manage to get TG/Freq info it will change frequency and follow it and the audio will be fine. I miss like 3/4 of the transmissions. I'm getting -102 to -104db into my SDS200 and SDS100, which is like 3/5 bars signal, but it pulses on and off and doesn't display P25 or Data except on rare occasions.

Video of what it looks like

 

[WoodburyMan]

100% Back to Normal now.

Seems whatever TX problems one of their site had is back to normal, no more error / CRC issues.

 

[WoodburyMan]

Late last week the CC channel switched to one of the ACC's, I suspect something to do with the issue they had.... It's already updated on the database.