Sure I can tell you my department operates on a P-25 capable, Motorola Smartzone, 800 Mhz system with XTS 3000, 5000 and 2500 portables but what fireman actually cares about all of that? Our primary focus is that when we need to talk that they work and we can talk. But when was the last time you sat down and clicked around the radio, hit the mayday button, or heard the evacuation tones? I'm sure the answer is too long ago. My point is that we are so dependent on the radio yet we devote no training time to using it or understanding it.
As I referenced in a previous post here :
http://hosejockey.blogspot.com/2011/09/redmond-symposium.html
We have to control the variables we are able to control all of the time and one of those is our radio. Too often we get on the truck in morning, check our airpack, put our gear on the truck only to wait until we get to the grocery store or run the first call to find that our battery is dead on our radio. In recruit school your are taught how to don and doff gear, how to check an airpack, how to pump, but very little emphasis is put on the one thing that can summon help from miles away, the radio. Let's think about how we store our radio, take care of our radio, or even hold our radio. I assure you of one of the last three items, you are doing one incorrectly. The antenna isn't a handle or a place to clip the speaker mic to, the radio should be cleaned of all debris just like an airpack, and balling the radio up with the antenna curved isn't the recommended storage method.
The next question I have is, how do you operate your radio? Do you know what your radio does when you press that magic orange button? How do you reset that same button? Can you access you mutual aid company's channels without asking for help. Most folks are on 800 MHz systems so you have hundreds or talkgroups programmed in, but can you navigate your template? I have done some radio training throughout our department, and I have come to find that the majority of people don't have a clue where talkgroups are in our current radio.
We need to remember that besides our training, experience, and knowledge the radio is our primary lifeline. The IC can't tell us that we could be in danger or that there is a victim in a particular room if we can't hear him because our radio is dead, not turned on, or on the truck still. On the flip side, we can't let the IC know that we are in trouble or call for help if the same conditions mentioned before exist.
I make a challenge to each of you (All five readers) to answer the following questions about communication the next day you are at the Firehouse:
1) What happens when I press the Mayday button?
2) What is the comm procedure for a mayday? (Who switches channels etc)
3) How do you access your mutual aid department's primary tactical channel?
4) Do you have a contingency plan for simplex communications if you cannot get a repeater in a building?
5) Do you know how to make contact with adjoining counties/cities if called to assist in a large scale incident?
These are just some questions to get you started, but I think you see how much we all really don't know about our primary help line in what we do. Communication lines are always listed as a contributing factor in LODD's, but what have you done to improve them where you are? Remember folks who had comm problems on an emergency scene never thought it could happen to them, but it did. Prepare yourself by controlling the communications variable all of the time, instead of letting it take control of your emergency scene.
Until the next one,
Stay safe, and stay trained.
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