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Should all members of a department have portable radio's
I am on a small department in south west Iowa. We have 25 members and cover 2.2 sqaure miles. 22 of our 25 members live in town. Only officer's can respond to the scene and everybody else goes to the station. Our chief issued a HT 1000 portable radios to all the members . My idea was to mount chargers on the wall near the trucks if it's a fire call grab a radio on your way out the door because I dont think that all members need a radio assigned to them. But he wanted everybody to take a radio home with them even though the rules he laid out says that only officers will go enroute over the radio for all calls, EMT's /paramedics for medical, and divers for water rescue. The firefighters are not allowed to talk on the main dispatch channel only our fireground channel. I also think that there is more potential for these radios to be broken or stolen just lying around somebodys house or left in a POV. Does anybody else have an opinion on this.
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Brian Dumser on
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Start applying for those grants now! You'd think that if the Government was going to mandate this, that they'd come up with some way for smaller F.D's to afford the additional cost.
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Permalink Reply by BillySFCVFD on
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Hey Brian,
Thanks for the reply. We have received grants in the past but our Chief is concerned over these new FCC rules and if we will have enough radios in the future. With state and Fed grants, if granted, plus out of pocket spending we might be OK it's just that every member not on probation has a hand held now. The majority are older Motorola GP300s, I have one, and a few are newer narrow band compatible. My county as a whole, LEOs included, does not use narrow band as of now but will be forced to NLT when the FCC makes them, then my VFD will be forced to. I would think that is way before the FCC hammer comes down but then again I know my county. I'm new to my VFD and very proactive especially when it comes to equipment maintenance, mostly vehicles, and procurement. I'm looking for info from others who have had experience receiving grants for radios so I can pass it on to my Chief. TCSS
PS Sorry for getting off the thread subject but since it's old I saw no problem.
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Permalink Reply by mike on
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well my department issues every body a radio and pager. but when we are dispatched for a call if you are goin to the fire house to make the run you have to tell dispatch that you are "on the air". and honestly i like doin this because it lets the officers know how many people they have making the call and wether or not they need to request a second dispatch.
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Permalink Reply by brian rogers on
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I think its based on your area, in ours YES everyone should, but its our location and area that calls for it. We are located in rural Stephens CO. in Texas, we cover an area of 142 sq. miles with some pretty rough country, so communications out here is very important. Now it can become a burden with too much chatter on the radio, that's were training comes in to play for your department., people have to learn when to talk and when not to.
We need it out her and I am sure others do as well,but it has to be based on NEED versus Want.
Our department ( www.waylandvfd.webs.com ) needs to be able to talk to one another is critical situations and there is no way around it, we don't have the manpower to assign certain people to just talk on the radio.
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Permalink Reply by PA Firefighter on
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Most of our on duty people have portables. the problem is that some people love to hear themselves. Hard for the officers to communicate. getting stepped on all the time. My fear is one day someone will step on a mayday.
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Permalink Reply by Bill Mulligan on
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If it is possible all members should have a radio. I know it is hard to supply them because of cost but with a little research you can find affordable radios. All members should have the ability to transmit conditions inside and advised of any emergency they may have from finding victims to reporting a mayday. Without a radio a firefighter in trouble may have to depend on being found by another member. This delay could be the difference between making it home witch should be our first job.
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Permalink Reply by Jeremy Bolster on
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I really don't think there is any reason for every member to have a radio. To much of a chance for blocking needed radio contact. And if you are not allowed to go to the scene, what point do you have to have the radio outside of the scene.
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Permalink Reply by Kirk D. Baughman on
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i'm on a department that has about 50 members. all members have pagers and portable radios. we have 6 station in our county with around 8 members per station. each of our stations have 2 or 3 trucks in each station. i think it's a good ideal for all member to carry radios. i thinks it's a great tool for all members to carry a radio. if their a call we answer up but not all the time does everyone answers up. as a sr. member or officer depending on the type of call you can have other station page out. theirs been time were it's just been one or two people answer up so we just had another station page. we tryed at one time to place radios near the trucks and we would just forget to grab them or they we dead. now that we have to carry radios it's our job to make sure the radios are charge. we may loss one or two radios a year but it happens anywere you go.
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Permalink Reply by Dennis Brown on
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Well in my old department it was 3 sq miles with 6 cos.so with 6 chiefs 6capts 12 lts. you know what kind of cluster f--- we had on a worker but i dont think all members should have one in my co.now we have 3 behind driver and the team leaders carry them but some times i think we all should have one do to a emg.god forbid like a mayday
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Permalink Reply by Tom Eades on
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It sounds like your chief is taking the right approach; the keys here are standards and training. Every member should be made painfully aware of how expensive portables are, and exactly what these radios are to be used for. There should also be repercussions for those who allow their radio to get in the hands of their children, or who key them open for extended periods while sitting on them. Having the radios at the station comes with its own set of problems; at our house, which has other town employees passing through, we've ended up missing some of them.
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Permalink Reply by paul vance on
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Our dept issues radios to all firefighters we have all police and ems frequecies in our district we cover 220 sq miles. Having the radio is very beneficial to us as we can monitor ems and police and have a heads up on mvc and other incidents where we may be called. Some car accidents get called in and ems gets the call when they arrive on scene the car is actually over the side of a raven and we need to be called for tech rescue. by knowing our area and locations we can get a crew of trained tech rescuers enroute to the station before the call goes out and reduce the response time for the patients. Also it helps us to know other hazards we may be facing that dispatch did not mention. Yes all of our memebers are responsible and if you have people that are irresponsible they may be a hazard to your life as well. Also as well we have had periods when Ice has knocked out power and the only communication we had was by radio this helped many citizens in our community when they could not get a call to ems or they police. We have strict policies on radio transmission and we remain a professional dept on the radio surronding depts. that can monitor and hear our traffic always tell us how great our transmissions are and how proffessional we are.
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