In cooperation with Mercer EMS, Inc. and the Mercer County Emergency Management Agency, the Mercer County Fire District recently constructed a state-of-the-art digital radio repeater system to provide communications capabilities for first responders in Mercer County. Numerous factors played in to the construction of this system including the need to replace aging communications infrastructure and a mandate from the FCC which requires radio spectrum users such as police and fire agencies to upgrade to more efficient, modern equipment. Our new radio system consists of four radio repeaters located throughout the county, new mobile and portable radios, and dispatch software and hardware. The system is a conventional, non-simulcast repeater system in the VHF frequency band. (This means that the repeater stations operate independently from one another which would allow for no breaks in communications with field units in the event of a major disaster or the failure of one or more towers.) The new system is capable of operating in both digital and analog modes and provides portable radio coverage to 97% of the county and mobile coverage to 100% of the county and beyond. For more information on the technology we are using, please see our portable and mobile radio pages.

Following the transition to our new digital radio system, the MCFD continues to utilize analog VHF pagers such as the Motorola Minitor V for alerting of personnel. Pagers will be activated on the MCFD primary channel. As in the past, scanner radios and other analog receivers will be able to pick up the initial alert tones; however, fire and EMS units may communicate after the initial tones in digital mode in the future. At this time, there are no commercially available receivers capable of decoding the digital transmissions on the MCFD repeater system.

The live audio feed is currently down due to upgrades at the MCFD EOC communications facility.