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Southern California Monitoring Association
From ARRL.com Senator Ted Cruz, in a strong pre-Memorial Day message, publicly highlighted the critical role that Amateur Radio Service volunteers play during disasters, praising and thanking ham radio operators who provide essential communications when storms and emergencies knock out power and cellular networks and communities are cut off. Sen. Cruz observed that in these emergencies…
When everything is encrypted, the public must trust that agencies will release enough information quickly enough. Sometimes they do. Sometimes they do not. Garden Grove HazMat Incident Highlights the Public Safety Problem With Encrypted Radio Systems When a major hazardous materials incident forces evacuations, closes roads, disrupts schools, and brings a large multi-agency response into…
A major hazardous materials incident continues in Garden Grove after a large industrial storage tank containing methyl methacrylate (MMA) entered what fire officials are describing as a potentially catastrophic condition. The incident began Thursday afternoon, May 21, 2026, at the GKN Aerospace facility near Western Avenue and Lampson Avenue in Garden Grove. According to the…
From the Sky-Hi News: The Grand County Communications Center announced that, effective May 22, countywide public safety radio communications, including law enforcement, fire and emergency medical services, will transition to an encrypted radio platform. This change is being implemented to enhance responder safety, protect sensitive information and reduce the risk of public safety radio traffic being misused,…
Most radio monitoring enthusiasts are familiar with tracking technology such as GPS transmitters, LoJack systems, and automatic license plate readers. But a recent wave of cybersecurity research has revealed a surprising new tracking method that involves something found in almost every modern vehicle: the tire pressure monitoring system (TPMS). Researchers have discovered that the wireless…
Seth Hettena The After-Action Report Mar 04, 2026 A new shortwave numbers station appeared the day the bombs fell. Nobody knows who’s running it. A mysterious shortwave radio station began broadcasting strings of numbers in Farsi on the day Israel and the United States first struck Iran. It hasn’t stopped since. Numbers stations, as they’re…
A troubling incident involving unauthorized transmissions on public safety radio channels in Pittsburgh is drawing national attention within the radio monitoring community. Over several days in early March 2026, an unknown individual broadcast threatening and hateful messages over a public safety radio channel used by Pittsburgh police and emergency services. For scanner listeners and radio…
The Brief LOS ANGELES – A police pursuit in downtown Los Angeles ended in a crash early Wednesday morning (March 4, 2026) after officers responded to reports of gunfire at the Produce Market District. Two officers and the suspect were injured in the crash. What we know: Officers with the Los Angeles Police Department responded just after…
More than fifty years after its debut in the jungles of Vietnam, the North American Rockwell OV-10 Bronco remains very much alive in the skies—though in missions its original designers could hardly have imagined. Conceived in the 1960s as a rugged counter-insurgency aircraft and forward air controller, the twin-boom turboprop earned fame in Southeast Asia,…
