Monday, May 15, 2006
An Open Letter To The Blah-ger...
Kind of a short Blah-g this AM as I received a nice letter from a fireman that can offer prospective on this 800 Meggy Hurts Cyst-Em from BOTH sides of this county. It’s a very interesting letter that I think is worthy of the eyes of Richard Matason, Mark Brammell and Especially the Westmoreland County Commissioners.
Although it is published as an ANONYMOUS letter, the Fireman is known to me, otherwise I wouldn’t publish it. That goes for anyone that might wish to answer his letter with a letter of their own. I will also publish yours as ANONYMOUS, but I must know who your are and what fire department you are with. If you are not with a fire department just say so, but as policy I will not publish letters from those who withhold their identity from me. Letters from the Police and EMS also welcome.
I would have thought that in the YEAR or more that I’ve been publishing the Blah-g I would have received some sort of official response from the Top Cat or Deputy Dog by now however nothing. I did however ( as most know ) receive an official response back from the Commissioners Office. Not from the commissioners, just their office. Their stance was that everything is perfect and for me to quit rocking the boat.
We all know better, it’s the COMMISSIONERS that are blinded by their own Light. Admitting problems would be admitting their own fault ( by bringing this 800 Meggy Hurts Cyst-Em into our lives ), on a lighter note MOTOROLA AND MR. STALEY SURE LOVE THE MIGHTY THREE $$$ !
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Ok, just a few notes… if you have an 800 Mhz digital scanner and you are listening to our finest there is new activity on Police District 2 which is reserved for Murrysville, Delmont and Plum Borough Police. Delmont which is now with Police District 5 (temporarily) has been using TalkGroup 52, District 2 PD to talk back and forth to Murrysville.
For their own police operations, Murrysville is still on VHF and will stay there for the most part of their new 3 year contract. Murrysville PD is under the fine guidance of their most competent Chief Thomas Seefeld.
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New audio clips should be posted by Monday afternoon if they aren’t there already. Check ‘em out !
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And did anyone record the last episode of the West Wing last night ? If so please send me a copy. I missed it as I was on a secret mission… I’ll tell you about it later.
That’s it and here is the open Letter to the Blah-g:
** BEGIN **
Dear Mr. Blah-g’er,
I am writing to you today to address some of the problems I have come across in the 800 “mega hurtz cyst-em”. I myself am a firefighter in a rural area of western Westmoreland County. My station and I have not come across any issues with the system in our area. When we operate on an incident, we have very clear signals and are able to communicate with everyone on the fire ground and fire dispatch. This doesn’t surprise me in the very least, because according to your maps, we have a total of 22 towers covering the central/western areas of the county. The problems I have encountered have been when I was traveling through the eastern part of the county.
That having been said; let me tell you about some of the problems I have encountered personally with this system. I, myself, carry a portable 800 radio. The radio model is a Motorola XTS 1500. I receive 12 fire channels, 4 county-wide channels, and one talk-around channel. That makes a total of 16 channels, all of which become useless when I encounter a “dead spot” in the county.
This is why I am writing to you today. I like to take trips throughout the countryside and enjoy the more serene parts of Westmoreland County. The other day I was enjoying a nice look at some beautiful landscape by long bridge on route 30 in Darlington by Idewild Park. My beautiful landscape was interrupted by a long “BOOOOOOOOP” noise from my portable. The only 2 times I get this noise is when I have no service on the radio OR when all 5 frequencies are tied up and I try to key up my microphone, but more on the latter later. I was stunned to see that near a major entertainment area / recreation area that there was such a large dead spot. I began thinking immediately that any of the houses I had seen there would be in terrible danger if they were to have an incident in that area. If the communications system is down, we could lose emergency personnel, civilian life, anything could happen when nobody can talk to one another.
This was a major concern of mine, and would like it to be brought to attention that 4 towers in the eastern part of Westmoreland County is not enough to cover what is needed. I myself do not know how many it would take, but seeing as how the western part of the county has 22 towers and great coverage, then the eastern part, with all those mountains, would probably need several more towers. I find it disturbing that if an incident were to happen, the emergency personnel would be without communications. I say build more towers. It’s a simple solution to a complex problem.
One of the other major concerns I have is about the number of people who can talk at the same time. I don’t even mean on the same channel, on the same talk group, I am talking about the entire overall system. I have come to find that if two police officers, on two different channels are talking, one EMS is talking to a hospital with a patient, and two fire personnel are talking on two different channels, I cannot key up on my channel, even if it is free. That means the two officers are on dispatch and Tac 2, EMS is on Tac 2, and the fire personnel are on Tac 5 and Tac 10, and I go to key up on Zone 3 Fire Command, I will get a busy signal “system in use”. This is because of the number of free “frequencies” we have with this system. We have a total of 5. This means that only 5 people can talk at any given time. If a 6th person tried to talk to 911 to report an incident, or give a command to evacuate the building, the message will not happen until someone else stops talking. I find this a bad situation waiting to happen, because when a snow storm during winter times and a severe thunderstorm during spring come across the county, several departments, including fire, police and EMS are all activated to attend to certain situations. If this system stays the way it is, we are in for a world of hurt.
This is because we get several thunderstorms across the county, usually from April to September. When one moves across the county, usually the western part of the county is dispatched first, seeing as they are always first hit, then the activations move across the county with the storm as more incidents happen. What happens if it gets icy out during winter, and we have several accidents throughout the county? What if the 5 open slots are filled? Let’s say for instance a fire chief gets on scene of one of the simulated accidents here, and calls for his rescue truck to expedite (hurry up). But when he keys up he hears the “BOOOOOOOOOOOOP” noise because the system is busy, or he is in a dead spot? Innocent lives could be lost and guess who it comes back on? You guessed right, Westmoreland County 911 and the WCDPS, Westmoreland County Department of Public Safety.
These are just a few of the problems I have personally encountered with the 800 system. Not saying they always happen, but the happen enough to be a cause for concern.
Thank you for taking the time to read/post my letter. If I come across any more problems or can think of anything else wrong with the system, I will submit another letter. Thank you again.
Sincerely,
“Down in Flames”
** END **
I leave you with this. If a car was built that would get 300 or more miles per gallon, looked like a million and came in every size with very option available, plus it would go from 0 to 60 in 3 seconds, and it only cost $1,500… would you buy one ? The dealership would also give you at least $2,000 for your trade-in, making this virtually a free car as you would get at least $500 back just to own one.
Of course you would, or at least most of you would.
There is only one draw back to having this car. You have to promise the manufacture that you will not live in the same county for more than one week, then you must move on and you cannot live in the same county twice. Gee, 60 some moves and you are out of our state ! Does the car still sound like a good deal ?
Perhaps you would rather have a free first class seat in the newest Shuttle going into space. It is like riding in a will oiled car and as big as a hotel with lots of room for you. It's called the Motoshuttle. The only problem is that the space agency can only launch the vessel, there is no way to bring it back to Earth.
Kind of sounds like this Radio Cyst-Em… it only works where it has a signal, in all other places it is a DEAD DUCK in a DEAD SPOT. What good is a few thousand dollar radio if it doesn’t work EVERYWHERE ?
And we have thousands of these DEAD DUCKS !!
Someone ask your favorite Commissioner that, AND remember all of this when the Commissioners are up for election.
DECODED,
K3SAM
http://800.k3sam.com – web
news@k3sam.com – email
