• Washington County, TN Digital
• Weather Radio Drawing II
• Abingdon, VA Digital
• Raccoon Season - Tracking Collars
• Winter Weather is here
• Halloween
• Twitter Changes
• Plane Crashes (locator transmitters)
  

That's just a couple, check out the Radio Phonebook (Link at the end of newsletter)

Washington County, TN Digital System

Last month we reported on some of the new equipment.

As Promised, Washington County Tennessee’s new digital system has begun testing and is in
the process of being brought fully online. Reports initially were that a majority of the traffic would
utilize encryption and be impossible to monitor. Thankfully, our sources indicate that only a few
of the talkgroups will be encrypted, such as: Narcotics, Swat, Detectives, etc. We may never know
all the encrypted talkgroups, however with the absence of certain departments during incidents, it
shouldn’t be too difficult to determine them by process of elimination.

So far here’s what we know…
Here are the new P25 Digitial frequencies, currently the highlighted ones are active

857.2125 is currently being used as the control channel

So far only a few "testing" talkgroups have been reported, One agency in the county has recently applied for a license to operate on the same type of technolgy, Embereeville FD will be utilizing P25 on the following frequencies.

Both of these frequencies will be used in P25 digital format, so you'll need a digital capable scanner as well.
Theres a good possibility the radios will be used in both modes, clear audio and P25. You should be able to
listen to some traffic for a while with your older scanner until all their radios are replaced.

We'll keep you posted as more become available, in the meantime we need your help!
If you live in the area and have a digital scanner, see if you can pickup any addtional talkgroups.

Also pictured is a mobile version

click each for larger

The town of Abingdon, VA has been testing a new digital system on 154.385. The emissions were first noted on or around October 9^th as a loud 4 second digital carrier repeated every several minutes. Further analysis revealed that the signals were a digital format called MotoTRBO. A quick check of the FCC database shows this frequency licensed to the town with the attention to field being the Abingdon Police Department.  Further research and field testing have been unsuccessful in locating the source of the transmissions, originally believed to originate from the “water tower” hill south of Valley St as indicated on the license. The input frequency 158.865 has been silent and the output mentioned above can be heard clearly in Johnson City, TN and Elizabethton, TN to the south as well as Marion and Rural Retreat to the northeast.

An unnamed source advised that the fire department had acquired the new equipment, supposedly to be Motorola XPR-6550 handhelds (list price $970.00 each) and a XPR-8300 repeater (list price $2500.00). We were also advised that the police department had access to and was using the frequencies as well, additionally there was mention that this frequency was also tied via a VOIP type connection to another system currently used by the town.The radio model and repeater above only operate at UHF frequencies, so were suspecting they are using the repeater used by the public works department or have a different frequency. We are questioning the validity of this infromation in reguards to the current FCC license allowances.

On a side note, the frequency 154.385 is only licensed for fire service operations, so If they are operating in compliance with federal law I would suspect only the fire department will be utilizing the 154.385 frequency. Why they bought UHF radios, is somewhat of a mystery. Also in the top story, Embreeville Fire Department is licensed for the same frequency, what a conicidence! Let's just all hope they are not just picking a frequency and setting up a repeater with no reguard to the licensing.
We’ll keep an eye on the license data to see if an exemption or modification is granted.

Now for some bad news, MotoTRBO is a digital format similar to Nextel that no scanner can monitor. Abingdon was the first in the area to use MotoTRBO with the public works frequency and now that technology has possibly spread to the other agencies. The biggest advantage over security is that each frequency can support two simultaneous transmissions at the same time.  

Raccoon Huntin'

Raccoon season has more to do with radio signals than meets the eye, two-way radios, and radio tracking collars are a starter. Times have changed for the better and worst, but that question really depends on how you look at it. Back in the good’ ole days people set their dogs out at dark and chased after them into the abyss with only the sounding of howls and bells attached to their collars. Communications from the hunters was limited to whistles and hoots and hollers.. Then comes along technology!

Today, the practice is augmented with two-way radios and signal emitting transmitters that can be used to pin-point the dogs location and even whether or not the’re looking up, barking, moving, still, or pointing. Some models rely on a rudimentary signal that must be tracked with a directional antenna while others send the dog’s latitude and longitude out via radio. Communications have evolved much since the Andy Griffith days; remember those big old military walkie talkies? Currently, FRS/GMRS and even MURS radios give reliable communications for several miles.

Well now for the good stuff, lets get right to it

The radio term "attenuate" means to throttle or reduce, the application term refers
to what's called an attenuator. The hunter's radio receiver is usually equipped with an attenuator; The gain of the signal can be selected so when close to the dog the signal can reduced to allow a more accurate fix on the position.

And last but not least, the raccoon hunters here in Virginia have been frequently using Marine VHF radios for communications, technically illegal (unless being used nautically.) This practice is becoming more and more widespread and has been reported to have been used by alleged poachers in central VA.

Heres a couple hits from our last mountaintop excursion.

156.275
156.700

Its Getting Cold!

It's that time of year, here's a refresher on Snow Plows, and School Buses.
How else are you going to know what the road conditions are at 5AM.

Russell County Schools - Trunked System (shared)

Sullivan County, TN Trunked System
Talkgroups

Halloween

With the increase in crime over the past several months, its probably a given that October 31st will be a busy night, Be sure to check out the live scanner feed and follow the latest on twitter. We're up for an all nighter, care to join us?

Live Feeds - Twitter

Twitter Changes

Due to some issues with Spam and "Scanner Haters" we've decided to make our tweets "protected". Just send a request and it'll be approved as soon as possible.
As for the later reason, we've decided to practice the concept of "not feeding the trolls" and its working. In the future most of your incident reports will primarly be posted to our twitter account. If you see our infromation somewhere else getting flamed or bashed, put in a good word, you wouldnt be reading this if you didnt just love.. Scanie the scanner!

Hug Please?

Plane Crashes

There have been at least two plane crashes in the immediate area since the last newsletter, tragically one with two fatalities in Carter County, and the other miraculously had three survivors in Russell County.

In the event of a crash planes are equipped with an emergency locator transmitter,
These operate on the following frequencies:

Immediately following a crash in the area you can help search and rescue teams by listening to the above frequencies, we recommend if you hear the siren sound (examples below) you use the non-emergency phone contacts listed in last months newsletter as emergency 911 circuits would be busy and need to be left open. In several incidents local amateur radio operators have actively listened for traffic on these frequencies and coordinated traffic with local search teams.

Since February, 2009 the 121.500 frequency is no longer monitored via military satellites.. Thus, leaving downed aircraft without the newer digital Eperb type aboard to only be monitored locally by ground crews or local search aircraft.
If the elt battery is dead or if the tail is destroyed (elts are usually in the tail) there will be no signal

If there’s an active distress beacon it will sound like a siren.
Here’s a few recordings..(wav format)
Sample 1
Sample 2
Sample 3

And here’s lot’s more info from Wikipedia.

By the way, if you live near an airport these are sometimes activated by accident or by hard landings automatically. However, either case.. they usually get a response from the Civil Air Patrol, I know several longtime pilots that have had their life-time most embarrassing moment to see teams show up at their private hanger due to accidental activation.

Heres a sneak of next month's Article

We'll take you along on a radio field trip and share some of our frequency gathering secrets!


Mobile EVDO Internet


Portable Antenna deployed 50 feet up

General Area Covered