BRUNSWICK COUNTY -- Yesterday we told you about some problems Brunswick County is having with its 911 dispatch calls and emergency radio signals. Today officials explained what they're doing to fix the problem.
Officials say they're raising their radio towers and adding more.
Right now there are 10 towers transmitting radio signals throughout Brunswick County's 852 square miles.
Officials say right now those towers are able to send out radio signals to 95 percent of the county.
The area with the least coverage they say is the northwest part of the county.
Deputy Director of Emergency Services Tom Rogers said, "The mobiles in their cars have adequate coverage there but it's the portables that raise concerns."
Two more will soon be added to help boost coverage in the growing county: one on Bald Head Island, the other in the south end of the county.
Along with more towers, they plan to make some of the existing ones higher.
Rogers said, "It will improve the quality by giving a cleaner signal, they, have cleaner transmissions, less static, things of that nature."
Bradley Suggs is a volunteer firefighter in Supply. He says he's experienced problems with his emergency response radio while on the job.
Suggs said, "I'm a volunteer firefighter and I'm always wondering if I go into a burning house and the roof collapses and I call for them on my radio, am I going to get out?"
Suggs doesn't think the planned improvements will help, saying, "They've lied to us so much now that it's hard to believe. They're going to have to show us it will work."
Emergency officials in Brunswick County say they will start construction on the Bald Head Island tower next week.
Construction on the south end tower will begin in a couple of months.
Officials say to help with the lower signal quality in the north end of the county, they plan to raise the tower in Leland.
Brunswick County Radio Systems
I have read alot of the comments that have been posted on this system as of late. First, why are we fighting???? We are all here for one goal....to help someone!!!! We need to FULLY understand, some of these problems were inherited by those who are in the admin positions now, they probably did not even realize what they were getting into. Its NOT fair to hold them accountable either. Why harass and curse at them, its NOT their fault!!!! Yes, it may have been a poor choice in the beginning, but its the system we have, so lets make it work. Quit bickering, arguing and harassing the ones who are trying their BEST to make something work!!!! Lets work together and MAKE it work. To those who posted, "lets go back to the string and can", go back!!!!! It must not have been a good system. Our system is alot better NOW, than THEN!!!!! Our county is working toward improvements. Are they up to par, where they should be? NO!!! I also believe it has been identified and is being worked on. But its alot closer now than it used to be!! Lets ALL remember, CHANGE takes TIME!!!!!! Rome wasn't built in a night!!!!!!
Time to Realize
I agree with some points of the above. Yes as responders we are stuck with this system.
We have to learn how to use the system.
Here is the basic theroy......
You have 3 primary channels.
Dispatch= On this channel you receive your initial call information. Basically location and whats the nature of the call. ALSO Paramedic units check enroute on this channel.
Command A&B= Responding units above Hwy211 use Command A, Below Hwy211 uses Command B. ALL apparatus checks enroute, onscene, and assignment complete. Additional call information is given by dispatch. For Fd's the initial officer enroute and who ever has incident command. All traffic on these channels are to be between responding Apparatus, Incident Command, and Dispatch.
Tach= These channels are assigned by the dispatcher. It is a dedicated channel for your department to talk amongst each other onscene. Dispatchers can still monitor your traffic on these channels. These are the channels you can do roll call on say whatever you want to.
What changes would you make to this? If nothing then stick to it. There is so much radio traffic on command A&B that could be cut out!
OpSec
Ever heard of Operational Security? Should you really give this information on a open web site?
opsec
give me a break. the average scanner land citizen knows how things work better than the responders who use it. what op sec are you talking about?????????? go to radio reference on the net, hell you might learn something.
Why not?
The information above has nothing to do with any emergency plan or operation. A junior in High school that signs up with his local fire department has access to this information the first night he joins. It has no bearing on anything security wise.
And you cant access the system with just any old radio. It has to be programed by the county.
Brunswick
Well if you could type proficiently so someone could understand your questions then maybe someone could respond....
Mobiles
The mobiles have adequate coverage? Thats why the infamous SEARCHING display is on at lets see....133 2 mile stretch near Orton Plantation, lots of Ash Little River road Ethridge road, Mt Misery and 74-76, Pretty much any Restruant or Food Lion, The counties very own EMS base 6 "ASH" and base 5 "BSL" where the Minitor pagers don't even work. And why don't you ask the sheriff's dept why they are all on the old radio system.
Why were we so worried about a radio system that was easily fixed... WHEN THE COUNTY CAN'T EVEN STAFF THE AMBULANCES TO GET TO THE CALL!!! and further more there are 8-10 slots open at 911, Almost a whole shift gone at EMS, and more looking to find other jobs from 911 and EMS. Probably because they are tired of being lied to by admin and being told the famous song and dance by Randy "Yall just hang in there". Well sir... they don't seem to be hanging in there.
It sounds like we are batting Zero for 3 in this county. No one to dispatch the call, then a radio that just might work, and then no body to run the call.
They Better hope and pray nothing happens to my family due to one those problems.
Boy are you telling the
Boy are you telling the truth! The same problem is going on in Columbus co too. They say they are fixing the radios but we have yet to see it. It is going to cause someone to to get hurt or die before anything happens & that is sad.
Testy, testy
Well, apparently there is more than one person here who honestly believes that they know what they are talking about. VIPER is not a type of radio system, but an acronym that stands for Voice Interoperability for Public Safety Responders. VIPER is comprised of an Omnilinked 4.1 Motorola Type II trunking system. Since the Motorola 4.1 system named “VIPER” is owned (not leased like SC) by the North Carolina Department of Crime Control and Public Safety, I have to agree that VIPER itself is not very effective in other portions of the Eastern US, especially across state lines.
However, I must say that there are 25 Motorola 4.1 systems in North Carolina that pre-date VIPER including Charlotte, Durham, Fayetteville, and Asheville just to name a few.
As far as your PS1 and PS2, those are designated as interoperable talkgroups. They are designed to be talkgroups that connect UHF LTR users (law enforcement) with VHF LTR users (Fire/EMS). As I mentioned before, these talkgroups are connected by the means of a patch. A patch is nothing more that reducing a radio’s capabilities to its “least common denominator” and cross-band repeating voice communications. Granted, I have not personally laid eyes on the method used to interconnect the two systems, but I can just about guarantee that cross communication is accomplished by either hard-wiring two mobile radios together or (best case scenario) an electronic patch generated by a pc based computer console. Either way there are still two systems in different radio spectrums.
Correct…MA/COM’s EDACS system is a fine system. I’ve used that system with great results. Johnston and Harnett counties both use EDACS with much success. It is however worth noting that Harnett County and the multiple municipalities within the county are in the early stages of leaving their leases on their business grade (not Public Safety grade) radio provider for…(pause for effect…) VIPER.
For those of you under the impression the VIPER is a wolf-in-sheep’s-clothing of the Highway Patrol coming in and taking over your radio system, you’re just wrong. HP has enough traffic of their own, and no time to even try to come in and take over your radio system. VIPER is just the infrastructure.
So in the end of all this name calling and misinformation the fact remains, VIPER is coming to Brunswick County. The State is not going to skip over BC just because the County does not want to play. If the county decides to ignore its presence and reinvent the wheel by building their own towers and systems, so be it. It’s just pissing away money, your tax money.
I have heard that the State
I have heard that the State funded VIPER for $10 million last year; however, that was for only one year. Now anyone (other than SHP) wanting to use it must pay a "Users Fee". Also; talked to some LEO folks in another county. Their comment on VIPER - "It SUCKS". Sound familiar?!?!?!
Work together
People, We are not getting anywhere unless we work together. I know for a fact that Fire,EMS,LEO, and Dispatch all want this system to work.That includes Hardware, software and Grey Matter. Quit attacking each other and lets work together. The user group meetings need to be advertised and we all need to go there and hold there feet to the fire. I am sad to say that unless there is divine intervention, we are stuck with what we have. I don't like it but we have to make it work for us. I have been at this for over 28 years. Hell I remember Fire phones and no pagers. Remember laying in the bed at night and listening for the siren to sound and flying blind into the night.
Ford had the Edsel, Dodge had the K car, and we have smartlink. The powers at be are determined to make it work. Will it????Dont know...All I know is that I don't want any of my brothers in emergency services to get hurt over a radio. So I say again, quit complaining and lets get together. I call for a county wide bitch session involving ONE officer form each individual agency to attend. You know as well as I that to many people becomes confusing. I am talking all agencies. It will be about 40 people. It is time to act. Lets start calling tomorrow and demanding this meeting.910-253-5383
Viper
Nice post fozbot98.....guru also failed to mention the awesome viper system was removed from Florida by Governor Bush and replaced with the MA/COM Statewide EDACS system.....but lets replace our county system with the states viper....go guru go....lets hear some more of your wisdom radio man.
Boat huh
Viper hasn't been effective in other portions of eastern US because it sucks major too. Sounds like you have being reading too many radio system articles on the internet and don't know crap about radio's systems. Smartlinks radio system does have the interoperability to talk between the law, fire, and ems...rather be UHF or VHF systems. Smartlink's system has channels sister together through software to allow communication between the two. PS1 and PS2 are an example there GURU!!!
Glad someone said it.
I was going to point out to mr guru that the last time I checked I had PS1 and PS2 in my mobile and portable that allowed me to communicate with fire and EMS. I have used them and they do work.....if you're close to each other and a tower. The old system did have to use a "3rd party word of mouth".
One thing that everyone is also forgetting are the telelcommunicators. I have set in there and heard bad radios come across needing whatever and they are frustrated as well because they dont't know what you need, who you are or where you are. Our lives are in their hands and they are just as upset about it as those of us on the road daily.
Can someone help?
Since all of you are the experts... Why won't might teleporter work in Brunswick County?
Is there a time warp or something there that won't let it work? (Sometimes I wonder about Brunswick County!)
Missing the Boat
Why pay money to someone to build the county a "new" system when the State is currently building a statewide system? Wouldn't it be cheaper just to buy the Motorola or Johnson P25 radios to access the State system rather than spending considerably more money to upbuild a less than adequate system? Yes, I concede that all the VIPER sites for Brunswick Couty are not operational at this time, but Brunswick will be exteremly well covered by VIPER very soon.
Other Counties are flocking to the system like: Wake, Pitt, Hyde, Orange and Sampson. It's so good that even users of the South Carolina Palmetto system are putting the VIPER system in their radios so they can have interoperability.
It sounds like to me someone in the Brunswick heirachy has a friend who owns a two-way radio company and a little "hanky-panky" is going on...
To make things worse, they bought TWO SYSTEMS in different radio spectrums. That's right Brunswick County, your law officers CANNOT DIRECTLY COMMUNICATE with Fire/EMS Responders. That communication relys on a the mouth of a Dispatcher, a electronic patch (which sounds better than it actually is) or each responder carring two radios everywhere they go(which leads me back to my conspiracy theory about the radio dealer.)
This new system DOES NOT even meet the minimum Project 25 interoperability standard established by the the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials, an industry, independent, 3-rd party who establishes BASIC standards. I think the US Attorney would find more INDESCRETIONS reviewing the purchase of these radio system comprised of old--I MEAN OLD--technology than poking around the Sheriff's Office.
Why don't we take this money spent on the bohemouth, archacic system and give raises to 911 dispatchers, EMTs, Fire houses and Deputies who stand on that thin line between calm and chaos???
Smoke and Mirrors
Well now im SO GLAD the public is recieving the same lies, smoke and mirrors routine that Fire/EMS/Law Enforement in brunswick county have been getting for some time now.
Ladies and Gentleman, this is NOT what the main concern that your FD's, Police, and Paramedics have been complaining about. There radios are getting service EXCEPT for out near orton plantation. The problem is the System itself. If you have any questions, see the first article on this subject. I think myself and others pretty much summed it up!
Dont buy the line of bull!
Just keep in mind that we were promised a much better system BUT we ended up with a system worse then what we started with. So basically the emergency services director has waisted millions of your dollars! Now he is smiling and taking more of your money to FIX his NEW System!
looking for excuses
You can tell that there is politicians at work here because they are always working on the problems, but yet nothing is getting done. After all thats what the problem is the start with there is problems with the system and there seems to be no one who knows what is wrong with it. I think It would be better to go back to the old string and can