[FedCom] CAP Radios

[MONIX]

Looks as the CAP (really the US Air Force) is spending up to $42 million 
dollars by 2009 for new radio equipment.

All of the new VHF radios will be P-25 Interoperable Narrowband Compliant.

These include over 5000 mobile, 2,500 handhelds, 400 repeaters (which can be 
controlled and re-programmed remotely via a telephone or link) and 100 
portable repeaters.

When these radios are issued CAP plans to transition to their new Narrowband 
Frequencies, some have already been heard, however many stations are still 
using the 148.150 et al frequencies.

Apparently the day of CAP using modified ham radios is gone.

In addition to this backbone of CAP communications, they are getting over 
10,000 ISR (Inter Squad Radios, a US Marine Corps project), these are 
actually ICOM IC-008M radios which are similar to FRS radios (like the 
IC-4008A) however they are on 14 federal frequencies.

Some of these ISR radios have already been lost, and this is a big deal as 
US Air Force federal money was used to purchase them.

And they are also getting new HF-SSB radios with ALE (Automatic Link 
Establishment) to assist working through difficult band conditions.

MONIX