(New Jersey/New York) – PRA members  in New York and New Jersey heard a steady carrier on 462.700 MHz for about two days, January 10-12,2008. The signal showed no signs of going away so members put their RDF capability to work. In a stunningly short time,  just thirty minutes,  the repeater site was located. The member locating the repeater determined that there was no signal on the repeater input causing the repeater to hang. The probable cause was believed to be a defective repeater controller.

The owner of the repeater could not be immediately determined by making calls on the repeater itself. Not a soul was listening on any active tone. There were an astounding number of CTCSS tones active on the system which begs the question are these tones all necessary?

The repeater antenna was located on a tower belonging to a television broadcast station. Contact was made at the station and the situation explained. Station staff were very helpful providing the telephone number of the manager for the station technical staff. Station staff did not know at the time who the repeater belonged to but assured the PRA member it would be turned off by Saturday morning.

The repeater did turn off finally and is no longer causing interference. The PRA Enforcement Teams would like to remind all repeater owners that you have an OBLIGATION to monitor your GMRS system to PREVENT such occurrences. Situations like this should not take days to resolve by other licensees.  The repeater itself had no control operator on duty to monitor it’s functions  and control operator is REQUIRED.

When no one is using a GMRS repeater system it should be turned off by a control operator to prevent unauthorized operation or malfunctions when no operator is on duty. This is particularly true in areas like New Jersey and New York where there are numerous GMRS repeater systems sharing the same frequency. It is the polite and courteous thing to do.

There are many areas of the United States still considered rural and very rural. Residents are isolated from civilization and often each other by choice. Living this way can present communications difficulties when land-line or cellular telephone services break down in inclement weather or, perish the thought, don’t exist at all.

The General Mobile Radio Service can be a viable communication tool in rural areas particularly if neighbors build a radio system together. Multiple families can purchase and install a repeater system with back-up battery power to use in the event of a communications outage. During the rest of the time the two-way radio system serves to link families and friends for social and business purposes. The family radio is a link to another family group since neighbors often count upon each other just for company as well for emergencies.

This is where everyone is reminded that the GMRS is more than just the two-way radio chew toys for sale at big-box stores. GMRS can be a sophisticated yet easy to use communication option complete with base stations, mobile units and hand-held radios. Let’s look at some possibilities.

The Family Farm

GMRS is a radio service that the licensee can use to conduct his or her personal business. As long as the licensee allows his or her immediate family to use the radio system and not unlicensed employees the family farm or ranch can use the GMRS system for the family business. Individual employees not related to the licensee can use the same system as long as they too are licensed and use their FCC assigned call letters.

The General Store

Wouldn’t it be great if you could call your general store on the two-way radio to give them your shopping list? As long as the store owner and his family have a GMRS license he or she can use their radio to chat with customers, friends and family.

Rural Churches

Rural pastors can use GMRS to stay in touch with the flock as long as each family has the appropriate GMRS license. Rural churches are important centers of activity and support for families living in isolation. As long as everyone (individuals) are licensed properly members of the church could sponsor and share a local GMRS repeater so that everyone in that area had a lifeline to one another.

Travel in Rural Areas

There might be cellular coverage problems traveling in rural areas that GMRS could solve. A well placed local system might provide families with communications on long or potentially hazardous local road trips in rural areas. Where conventional communication fails a GMRS system built by neighbors might provide two-way radio communication to people that travel.

Your own monitoring network.

It is certainly conceivable that neighbors who count on one another could establish a local monitoring schedule so that anyone traveling actually had someone to talk to. When you set the expectation it is a very good idea to make sure someone is actually ready to respond. It might not hurt to get important local folks licensed and equipped with a GMRS radio so that communication is even more meaningful. How about the local sheriff’s deputy and his family, local volunteer firefighters and medical personnel and maybe eve the country doctor. As long as these individuals license as individuals they can use the GMRS to be part of the community back-up system.

(Huntingtown, MD 051107) It was only a matter of time. Late in the evening of 5/11/07 a foreign ship off loading liquid natural gas at the local LNG facility appeared on the input of GMRS repeater KAF9830 located at PopularWireless and PRA HQ, the home of PopWireless Editor and PRA Board of Trustee’s President Doug Smith. The ship was operating on 467.650 MHz, a frequency not authorized for use or even suggested for use in the USA by ships from other countries.

A call to the on-duty security officer at the LNG facility succeeded in the ship moving to 467.600 MHz. That frequency is also not mentioned in any foreign treaty as authorized for use in the United States. Another follow-up call to the security officer moved the ship to 467.675 MHz which caused no end of grief for a GMRS repeater believed to be in Pennsylvania.

This particular night, tropospheric ducting was evident. The transmissions from the ship, using CTCSS encoding, brought up a repeater hundreds of miles away. An unidentified operator of the victim repeater using only a made up three-digit unit number, (output 462.675) repeatedly demanded the identification of the ship’s radio operator who could not hear the enraged repeater operator. Interestingly, this repeater is one that is so far unidentified. The same operators are routinely heard during tropospheric ducting events failing to identify with GMRS call signs. It was odd that one potentially unlicensed operator/intruder was demanding the credentials of another!

The captain of the vessel registered on the Isle of Man and staffed by a UK crew claimed not to have the 457.525 MHz and 457.575 MHz treaty channels required for use in the United States. Our NTIA regulations require visiting ships to use those two 457 MHz frequencies and NOT the GMRS frequencies. “Should the ship indeed not have the required US operating channels – well that opens up a whole new can of worms. What do we do then?” said Doug Smith, owner of the Huntingtown, MD GMRS repeater.

The LNG facility is conducting an inquiry and Riley Hollingsworth was notified by email. The PRA knows the name of the ship and will ask the FCC to write the shipping company upon conclusion of the LNG facility investigation. That facility remained steadfast in its support of the local GMRS community. The PRA and Popular Wireless Magazine are dumbfounded that the promised assistance of the Coast Guard is having no apparent effect on the problem in ANY US port. “We never saw a copy of the completed inter-agency memo. We just understood specific text was prepared for such a memo, to be sent as directed by Kris Montieth Chief of the FCC Enforcement Bureau. The FCC decided late in 2006 to no longer make certain enforcement letters and memorandum public,” smith said.

The acronym FSI was coined at PopularWireless Magazine to mean Foreign Shipping Interference or GMRS radio interference from foreign vessels improperly using GMRS repeater input or output channels while in US waters.