Uniden Announces New Scanner

Posted on January 25, 2012 by Admin

BC125ATUniden has announced a new analog conventional scanner expected to be available the first week of February.  List price will be $179.95 with a street price of around $140.

The BC125AT, 500 channels in 10 banks/50 channels per-bank, the BC125AT includes full VHF and UHF coverage (see the frequency chart below), including Air and Military Air channels, as well as full alpha tagging for all channels. PC programmability makes it simple to quickly program up for events such as air shows, auto racing, boat racing, and more.

Close Call® RF Capture including Do-Not-Disturb makes capturing those unknown frequencies a snap. Plus, Uniden has extended the Do-Not-Disturb functionality to include Priority channels, so annoying interruptions from priority or Close Call checks is a thing of the past.

The BC125AT includes all the feature enhancements you’ve come to expect from Uniden, including Temporary Lockout, CTCSS/DCS decoding, per-channel dropout delay, and complete search features, all in a compact, easy-to-carry chassis. Weather priority and weather alert will also keep you informed as to the latest weather and other hazard as announced by the National Weather Service.

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NASCAR Bans Driver-to-Driver Communication for All Races

Posted on January 25, 2012 by Admin

NASCAR RadioNASCAR has instituted several new rules to make racing more competitive and limit two car drafting this coming season.  Among the new rules that has nothing to do with the cars themselves – drivers may communicate with their spotter and their crew during a race but not with other drivers, spotters or crewmen from other teams.

In the last restrictor-plate race at Talladega last fall, drivers had a dozen or more other drivers they could talk to and made deals with whom they would draft with in the two-car tandems.

“Matt Kenseth … said anything that NASCAR can do to help us get back to 1 against 42 others, he supports, and I think that’s part of it, whether it be the confusion from the driver’s seat or the being able to cut a deal or whatever it is,” NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Director John Darby said.

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Pasadena PD Comms are Now P25 Encrypted

Posted on January 9, 2012 by Admin

Pasadena Police BadgeAs of January 7, 2012, the Pasadena Police Department’s radio communications have switched from analog to digital, preventing media outlets and radio enthusiasts from monitoring police calls.

The police department will make its $7 million leap forward from analog to encrypted digital transmission of radio conversations in a move city officials insisted was not about secrecy but safety.

“We are not out to avoid detection, but we are here to keep everyone safe,” said Steven Page, Pasadena’s telecommunications supervisor.

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Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Dept. Gets New Mobile Communication System

Posted on December 29, 2011 by Admin

Over the next 21 months, Raytheon will be working with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department to install mobile Panasonic Toughbook computers in roughly 2,400 police cruisers.

Deputies will be able to access the Internet, fingerprint databases and other criminal databases inside their vehicles, and use GPS positioning to get to emergency calls quickly.

The long-awaited digital upgrade is coming at a cost of $35 million, including a $19.9 million contract with Raytheon.

The three chiefs of the department’s three regions got together to decide how the new equipment would be rolled out, knowing everyone would want it right away.

So it’s being rolled out one station in one region at a time — first a station in Region 1, then a station in Region 2, then a station in Region 3, and then back around to a station in Region 1, and so forth.

In a statement, department leaders said the new equipment will dramatically upgrade the mobile digital equipment that’s been in place since 1987, for which replacement parts are no longer available.

“This huge leap in technology is important to the future of public safety for the millions of people living in the greater Los Angeles area,” the statement said.

“This new mobile data computer system will greatly increase the efficiency of deputies in the field, providing them more knowledge at their fingertips, and enabling them to do more for the public now and in the years ahead,” Sheriff Lee Baca said.

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Video: The DIY Magic of Amateur Radio

Posted on December 28, 2011 by Admin

ARRL’s new video, “The DIY Magic of Amateur Radio,” is an 8-minute video that follows some of the innovative, imaginative and fun ways “hams” use radio technology in new and creative ways. The presentation is directed toward the DIY (do it yourself) movement, which is inspiring a new generation of creators, hackers and innovators. The message should be helpful for existing members to shape the ways they understand and talk about ham radio. For more information and related resources, visit http://www.arrl.org/wedothat-radio-org.

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Police Departments Look to Tune Out Scanner Hobbyists

Posted on December 12, 2011 by Admin

Police EncryptionPolice departments around the country are moving to shield their radio communications from the public as cheap, user-friendly technology has made it easy for anyone to use handheld devices to keep tabs on officers responding to crimes.

The practice of encryption has become increasingly common from Florida to New York and west to California, with law enforcement officials saying they want to keep criminals from using officers’ internal chatter to evade them. But journalists and neighborhood watchdogs say open communications ensure that the public receives information as quickly as possible that can be vital to their safety.

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Fire Destroys Compton Police Radio Equipment

Posted on December 12, 2011 by Admin

Compton City LogoA fire broke out at a city fire station in Compton and destroyed $1.1 million in radio and communications equipment that the city bought last year in an ultimately aborted attempt to bring back its municipal police department.

The City Council, which had voted in the summer of 2010 to embark on a $19-million venture to start a new Compton Police Department, killed the project in April as it became apparent that the city was in dire fiscal straits. But the radio equipment had already been purchased.

City officials talked about selling the equipment to help the city deal with its budget deficit, which had ballooned to $39 million by July.

The blaze broke out at the racquetball court at the city’s fire station headquarters, where the radio equipment was stored, about 4:50 p.m. Sunday, Interim City Manager Lamont Ewell said. The fire was contained to the racquetball court, but the equipment was destroyed.

Ewell said a team of investigators from both inside and outside the city are looking into the fire, and the city’s risk manager is assessing whether insurance coverage applies to the destroyed equipment.

Source: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com

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Whoops… Mistaken Verizon Emergency Alert Scares N.J.

Posted on December 12, 2011 by Admin

Verizon WirelessNot quite the “War Of The Worlds” broadcast of a Martian invasion in New Jersey, a Verizon “emergency” alert Monday that the company texted to its wireless customers still jangled some nerves and triggered hundreds of calls from concerned residents to local and state offices.

The company sent the alert to customers in Middlesex, Monmouth and Ocean counties, warning of a “civil emergency” and telling people to “take shelter now.” Trouble was, the message was meant to be a test but it wasn’t labeled as such, Verizon later admitted.

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Police Employ Predator Drone Spy Planes on Home Front

Posted on December 12, 2011 by Admin

Predator DroneUnmanned aircraft from an Air Force base in North Dakota help local police with surveillance, raising questions that trouble privacy advocates.

Armed with a search warrant, Nelson County Sheriff Kelly Janke went looking for six missing cows on the Brossart family farm in the early evening of June 23. Three men brandishing rifles chased him off, he said.

Janke knew the gunmen could be anywhere on the 3,000-acre spread in eastern North Dakota. Fearful of an armed standoff, he called in reinforcements from the state Highway Patrol, a regional SWAT team, a bomb squad, ambulances and deputy sheriffs from three other counties.

He also called in a Predator B drone.

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Ham Radio in Hollywood: Comedian Tim Allen Stars as Radio Amateur on New TV Show

Posted on December 12, 2011 by Admin

Tim Allen Last Man StandingTim Allen — star of Home Improvement, Toy Story, The Santa Clause and Galaxy Quest, just to name a few — stars in Last Man Standing, an ABC comedy airing at 8 PM (EST) on Tuesday nights. Allen plays Mike Baxter, KA0XTT, a married father of three and the director of marketing at an outdoor sporting goods store in Colorado whose life is dominated by women. While Amateur Radio has not been prominently featured in the first episodes, according to John Amodeo, NN6JA — the producer of Last Man Standing — it is a part of the show and an important part of Mike’s character. The episode that will establish Mike as a radio amateur is currently scheduled to air in mid-January.

“Tim’s character Mike is involved in creating the sales strategy for the store, including their catalog and Internet identity,” Amodeo told the ARRL. “The store is like Bass Pro Shops or Cabelas. There is a strong self-sufficiency overtone to Mike’s approach to life. Ham radio fits in the story as a means of emergency communication. It’s not directly featured in the foreground story, but at the moment, it’s a background element on the home set. Once I allow something to be put on the set, there’s a chance the writers will feature it. Now that we have actually established Mike Baxter as KA0XTT, we can do more things featuring Amateur Radio.”

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