Through CA. FIRESCOPE COMMUNICATIONS WORKING GROUP, NIFC Communications will be coming out with a White Paper stating “All NIFC Frequencies Command and Tactical SHALL be removed from radios both mobile and portable, effective 2023 fire season.”
This is not up for discussion, this ruling comes from the Washington Office. But I would like see what your views points are so maybe just maybe we can sway they to see our VIEWS from the ground pounders.
Curious? Which Washington Office?
Why? So on incidents we get cloned with NIFC channels then delete them at end of incident?
This is an unfortunate decision, and one not actually able to be enforced. Agencies will continue to keep these frequencies in their radios.
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What will be interesting is if federal agencies will have to follow suit as well. This coming after a season where getting Command freqs up and running took forever putting a higher work load on Dispatch/command centers.
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That’s what I’m trying to get an answer to
So, the NAMING IS ALSO GONE!!! We in CA, are the only ones that NAME the NIFC CMD’s and TAC’s
I was just told NO, NIFC is not going to police that
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I wonder if they are planning to just kind of put them back in an up-for-grabs whatever frequency pool to be issued on fires instead of maintaining nationwide clearance on particular frequencies.
Still, I cast my vote that it is a bad idea. Better to have everybody on the same page as an incident develops than go mother-may-I and have them get back to you when they feel like it.
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Is this from the FIRESCOPE web page or internal to the working group?
While I’m honored you shared a screenshot of my website, I haven’t touched that page/site in quite a while (I need to though.) So please don’t count on the accuracy of these, there have been some changes since… 
As for the knee-jerk ruling (or rumor?) that this is, does that mean there will be a fully staffed comm tent on day two of every incident across the US ready to program every incident radio with whatever new solution this ruling provides? Day two air frequency orders work for aircraft because those radios are easily FPP, and ground radios only need to hand-jam a new A/G if not already pre-programmed. But woah to the entire 205 getting hand-jammed into a strike team worth of DPH’s and KNG’s (and APX’s), with no life-safety error accidentally thumbed into the radio for a new random command net and their assign DIV tac…
edit: also changes like this historically haven’t been done overnight “over February,” that’s usually a multi-season change to accommodate new procedures, multiple clone attempts to catch any stragglers or cache radios collecting dust in a closet, etc. Look back to narrowbanding, tone protection on tacs, fed rebanding, etc. To hear about this drastic of an idea in October for “2023 season” sounds like either a misunderstood rumor, or peter-principal just promoted a dumbass into a “washington office” who “knows what they’re doing.”
edit2: I wonder if this is a misunderstanding and is just a request to clear out any extended NIFC commands and tacs outside of the pre-established CMD1-12 and Tacs that were cloned in over the season’s longer incidents. “Command 65” in the 2021 season isn’t “Command 65” in 2022. Those extended freqs are temp borrowed from other fed agencies/freq pool and can cause issues if left programmed in stolen/discarded radios or if a hotshot crew finds a new “quiet” channel for their secret-squirrel chatter.
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Whatever their idea was based on, possibly the brain should have been engaged prior to the instructions being disbursed.
So now hoW can they have enough radio techs that will cumulatively have experience on any and all radios that can be found on an incident.
Or will not having an appropriate radio further thin down available resources ?
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This came from our conference call the last two days through the Firescope Communications Working Group so yes
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No the frequencies will be given out by the Communications Unit Leader when he or she builds their communications plan the ICS 205
Not at all Norcalscan. This came directly from the NIFC COMMS REP at our quarterly Firescope Comm Working Group that was the last 2 days. (I’m the SME on this Group)
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NIFC had no idea that most Depts in CA had NIFC COMMAND and TACTICALS in our radios all this time. So someone told them
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Policing??? NIFC will be sending out a White paper most likely saying You SHALL NOT have, you SHALL remove and not use unless authorized by NIFC or the COML on the specific incident. And NIFC won’t police the removal of those frequencies when you demob. Just like you SHALL not use any unauthorized frequencies that are not listed on the Communication Plan. HA!!! We as COML’s and COMC’s can only request.
Should be very interesting.
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It’s hard to refrain from commenting without official wording/waiting on white paper or Firescope memo, but everything about this just seems out of left field, or some sort of misunderstanding. There seems to be a huge disconnect between peter-principal in DC (or Boise), and the efficient and safe reality in the field (as we know it so far…)
I cannot believe an entity as strategic and (for lack of a better word) persuadable as Firescope (pardon if I’m misapplying some soft power here) is going to take this lying down.
An example of Comms moving forward would be things like standardizing tones across the fed, instead of just region 5, so Tone 9 is 100.0 from coast to coast, instead of being on the UT-MLF for instance having to declare “Moab, Engine 55 on MLF Forest Net Teat.” Removing preprogrammed standardized NIFC channels from radios is a massive step backwards in improving comm safety, especially in the first 1-4 days of a major incident where they often rely on preprogrammed standard freqs until COMT staffing and frequency orders can all get synchronized. (Looks at all the 2022 UTF’s for COMT’s)
Fires aren’t put out standing in line at the Comms tent.
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It must be a Motorol.a contract-bid issue. This is a $$ thing probably.
Love the “Fires aren’t put out standing in line at the Comms tent.” These days we must always look deeper into a decision that seems odd - $$.
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