It pays to know your gear!

Rockjet · Post by **Rockjet** » Sun Sep 23, 2007 10:41 am

Interesting conversation this morning between Geraldton base and a car, didnt hear the call sign. The vehicle was heading out on the highway south and requested what channels were best to use, base replied with about 5-6 channels of mainly North Midlands Towns. The vehicle then asked what was the other hand set used for. Base replied thats the long range radio. You can make a phone call on it but you need your call sign and my call sign to do this but I dont know how to use them. Vehicle came back with, do you need an aerial for this, they replied yes thats the long one one the back. The vehicle said, I'll just stick to my telsra mobile.

Suprising that neither knew how to use the HF and the officer didnt know or have a list of channels available in the country!

spartacus · Post by **spartacus** » Sun Sep 23, 2007 1:36 pm

and these are the people we expect to help us in an emergency,
do they teach you how to use a HF radio in training?

ryno · Post by **ryno** » Sun Sep 23, 2007 2:30 pm

spartacus wrote:and these are the people we expect to help us in an emergency

Don't call them then

Post by **Tyranus** » Sun Sep 23, 2007 4:57 pm

I know SES does! with each of our HF radios is a book with all the different set numbers/locations that you can call up. I'm actually rather surprised about that!

jmmw · Post by **jmmw** » Sun Sep 23, 2007 5:19 pm

ryno wrote:
spartacus wrote:and these are the people we expect to help us in an emergency
Don't call them then

radiotech · Post by **radiotech** » Sun Sep 23, 2007 5:20 pm

Whiskey1Urgent · Post by **Whiskey1Urgent** » Sun Sep 23, 2007 6:57 pm

spartacus wrote:and these are the people we expect to help us in an emergency,
do they teach you how to use a HF radio in training?

The HF (Barrett) radio hardly get used anymore.. It's terribly hit and miss and quite frankly, the majority of the stations have a sattelite phone which gives you secure comms without the drop out..

The Barrett has really ben taught for a few years and even if it was, it's hard to retain memory of something you rarely use when it's hard enough keeping up with changes in the crim code and other various statutes, keeping up to date with firearms and resus requals..

The HF set is at the bottom of the list..

Rockjet · Post by **Rockjet** » Sun Sep 23, 2007 7:07 pm

I have full confidence in our Police Force regardless if they know about HFs or not. I was just simply stating it was an interesting conversation.

Another conversation heard later was quite funny. The operater was confused as to which car was going where (2 jobs) so he said. "You guys can work out where you are going, I'll just sit back and listen". One of the cars came back and replied. "Would you like us to drop a box of tissues off for you".

Never a dull moment here in Gero!!!

spartacus · Post by **spartacus** » Sun Sep 23, 2007 7:13 pm

ok, maybe i was a bit harsh
the HF radio is not the most impotant peice of equipment in the police force. but I think that it pays to know how to use them in country areas; Not so much Geralton, but in the middle of the desert it may become a little useful when trouble arises.

Nick · Post by **Nick** » Sun Sep 23, 2007 8:15 pm

The current Police HF radio is the Codan NGT.

Post by **Tyranus** » Sun Sep 23, 2007 11:09 pm

and I think you'll find that a lot do. somewhere in the WAPOL section or one of the others someone said he'd heard Leinster, and I think you'll find that places like Leinster and Leonora and other remote communities probably use it, alot because they do a remote patrol that takes them 200km's away, at the same time they're doing speed trapping. Geraldton has a UHF repeater setup, and thus for the most part they can probably get away with just this.

PD224 · Post by **PD224** » Fri Sep 28, 2007 11:31 pm

thats pretty bloody funny... i thought you were joking towards the end i started to laugh then i realised you were serious