Published: June 08, 2007 12:47 am      

‘Scanner Land’ changing

Police, fire, rescue agencies moving to digital radio technology

FAIRMONT — It’s not quite time to throw away your analog radio scanner, the one you keep on top of the refrigerator in the kitchen or on a shelf in the TV room, or even the portable you carry in your car or truck.

But digital radio technology, particularly after 9/11 and the need for on-site direct communications between different police, fire and rescue agencies, is changing things in “Scanner Land.”

Experts say those who like to listen to what’s happening in the neighborhood by following emergency communications are going to have get digital scanners.

They can be expensive — at least right now. A brief telephone survey showed the Radio Shack Store in the Shop ’n Save Plaza on Fairmont Avenue offers digital scanners for sale.

The price is $499.99 for either a base or a portable model, a store employee said.

A digital scanner became necessary this week to follow Fairmont Police Department radio transmissions, officials said.

The city’s fire department will probably be next, said Carolyn Ledsome, director of the county’s 911 Central Communications Center.

“You still can hear our 14 volunteer fire departments in the county and the Marion County Rescue Squad” on an analog scanner, she said.

Eventually, the VFDs and the rescue squad will be converted to digital radio as well, she said.

About a year ago, Marion County Sheriff Junior Slaughter said he got a grant for the new system. He purchased the new digital radios for his deputies and “all of the communities with a police officer, like Mannington, Barrackville and so forth.”

“When we’re completed,” he said of the pending hookup with county fire departments and emergency medical services, “we’ll be state of the art in the country for 911 communications.”

The digital radio technology, which uses microwave towers to beam messages back and forth, will eventually connect every police, fire and emergency service in the state, Slaughter said.

The sheriff and Fairmont Police Chief Steve Cain said there are obvious advantages for police officers.

At a crime or accident scene, city police and deputies can talk directly to each other.

“The transmissions are also stronger” with the new system, Cain said.

Instead of having to use cell phones, officers and deputies taking prisoners to the regional jail in Doddridge County can now talk directly to the county’s dispatch center on their portable radios, he said.

And as police, fire and rescue agencies in Monongalia and Harrison counties switch to the new system — the three counties were chosen several years ago to serve as pilots for the state — officers in any of the three counties will be able to talk to their counterparts from Clarksburg to Morgantown, Chief Cain said.

Scanner fans reacted quickly, however, to the loss of the city police department radio traffic on their home machines.

Earlier this week as the last of the new digital radios in cruisers and unmarked vehicles were brought into service, transmissions from the Fairmont Police Department seemingly disappeared.

“People started calling us, wanting to know what had happened to our radios,” Cain said.

All things considered, the general public’s ability to follow police traffic has generally been “more helpful to us than not,” he said.

He feels the sticker shock that the price of the new digital scanners is causing, however.

“Still, the price will eventually fall” as supplies ratchet up to meet demand, Cain said. Emergency agencies across the country are switching to the new digital communications systems, he said.

A sales assistant at the Fairmont Avenue Radio Shack said Thursday the store has received a lot of calls this week about the loss of the city police radio traffic.

“A lot are calling because they think their scanners are broken,” said Josh, who preferred to give only his first name.

When an analog scanner picks up a digital signal, “it sounds like a truck running in the background.” Others describe the sound as like a chain saw.

“We still have analog scanners for sale, but we don’t recommend them,” he said. Customers are told they will only be able to listen to a limited number of agencies.

“When people come in to the store and we show them our digital base and portable model at $499.99 each, they get upset,” he said.

“Their immediate reaction is that we’re trying to sell them our most expensive models. Really, we’re not. Those are just the cheapest we offer right now,” he said.

He, too, expects prices to gradually fall. “Remember when video cassette recorders were new and they cost almost $1,000?”

VCRs are now easily affordable, Josh said.

E-mail Bill Byrd at bbyrd@timeswv.com.