Detroit Police radio systems go down just a couple days ago
Good thing the whole network of emergency responders don’t put all their eggs in one basket. Because, you know, that’d be bad. Especially in Detroit. You know, especially while this is going on.
Do you have your own communications squared away? What is happening in Detroit is not isolated to Michigan folks. Summer is coming.
No interoperability. If another agency was in-network, the alternate towers would’ve picked up the slack.
No redundancy for critical components. Since all the newfangled digital hardware is capable of analog operation, a conventional repeater could be placed on standby, for cheap, in the event of an emergency.
Centralized system. By not distributing resources amongst multiple options, the proverbial eggs were all in one basket. See also, Interoperability above.
PACE. It really is as simple as that acronym.
Yep. That, and being more complicated than necessary.
But theirs is not much different than VIPER or any of the other P25 systems out there. While over-redundant on security, everything has a lynch pin or an exploitable flaw.
I hope it serves two lessons- one, I’m not certain this was accidental. A disgruntled emcomm employee with a little too much knowledge is exploitable to those who wish to cause harm. And Detroit has been a leftist powder keg for a long time. Second, that blanket of security most folks call 911 may not always exist. A Survivalist should first learn to drop the normalcy bias.
Not sure I’m buying the “overheating server” narrative, either.
It also underscores the importance of Comms.
Dispatching is critical for emergency services to effectively function. Comms down: Tits up.
; )
Imagine a country of disgruntled “employees”, and the kind of fragility inherent in an on time inventory infrastructure of critical parts and components of present day supply systems that are suddenly overwhelmed by a spike in demand, especially where corporate SOP is to source everything from foreign lands. In a way I see that aspect as the lynchpin. And not just involving 2 way radio comms. Probably isn’t hyperbole to comment it would only take a handful of “disgruntled” employees to negatively effect the operation of a slew of key infrastructure.
What if only .mil and militarized fed agency’s are the only available government comms, wouldn’t it be like “those with the comms rule”? Portends a certain dynamic right there.
Amateur Radio comms kind of obtains a whole new meaning and a dynamic all its own in that light, as it already is a network of sorts, a very robust yet nebulous infrastructure which is not vulnerable in the way .gov comms are. Lot of natural built in resilience and flexibility, because if nothing else, the Amateur Radio community is chockablock full and built around, and because of, ingenious and inventive industrially productive people. The attributes of which can not be overstated.
Yep. Local, local, local. And in your control.
“Escape From Detroit”
*Reality show
Mike, good points. Call me cynical, or maybe provincial, but it strikes me the important truth about the truth of government is those running things are their own worst enemy because if there is one thing you can rely on is they are inherently self destructive via doing whatever is required to hide the truth to begin with because the whole edifice is illegitimate to its operational core and the consequences of that is almost predetermined. Corruption is governments reason now. Surviving that illegitimacy is become its reason for continuation. Stable infrastructure with built in robust redundancy and backup is anathema to how government functions in the first place, something that isn’t even a motivating consideration to begin with. Corrupt is corrupt, in every facet of the sphere of its operation. Any backup or redundancy built into the system requires even more long term planning and prepositioned resources. Those running things generally can’t even orchestrate and maintain a robust first line set of systems. It is signs of the downward spiral, other peoples money is running out, those running things are going to be the last to suffer the consequences, I suspect things like governmental comms going down is pretty trusty indicator the internal rot and decay has reached a critical juncture. Up in these mountains I live in, all but a small weekday 9-5 County Sheriff’s has been laid off. From 5pm – 9am, and weekends no county law, but for a staff at the county jail and skeleton dispatchers office. Good thing this area of WV is populated with solid God fearing people who really have no use for the law to begin with. I was really intent on watching what would happen, and it has so far turned out wonderfully, it is very peaceful and a different serenity, everyone seems to be on their best behavior, and have begun to watch out for each other and draw together quietly.
But you can see, and hear about signs of of effects of county and state fiscal austerity. It is telling the Sheriff’s where laid off before the desk jockey’s and just about useless make work road crews. How long before Detroit becomes Fort Apache The Bronx when the comms go down regular like or permanent?
I imagine Detroit, and, once upon a time I lived in that area (God Bless Dixie), eventually turning into “Escape From New York.” Chandeliers as hood ornaments and all. That place has been a cesspit for decades.
The problem is typically the gooberment/lowest-common denominator, and the reliance upon tertiary parties for the support and maintenance of mission-critical equipment, like the Commo infrastructure. There’s bureaucracy even in the installation and maintenance of this stuff.
NC Scout, Sparks31, et al are absolutely correct: get on HF or build your own infrastructure. I can’t think of a single repeater in my A.O. with battery backups or solar; so, to a certain extent, even the hamateurs are guilty as sin. It’s incumbent upon anyone with a Survivalist-bent, to have radio equipment whose intended operating environment is somewhere other than a recliner.
It’s even more important to have a plan.
….Escape from Detroit… 🙂
Brief overview of Chetnik G:
https://readfomag.com/2016/04/1941-chetnik-guerrilla-resistance/
check it out, great idea…the possibilities…there are certain secure local comms features, and there is a lot of prepositioned hardwire already strung…
http://freenorthcarolina.blogspot.com/2016/05/field-phone-prototype-demo-160426.html
pretty cool.
Repurpose the hard wire telephone lines in your neighborhood into a hillbilly net/one big party line/early warning/minuteman system. Everyone who can wired into the system has a car battery hooked up with a solar cell to charge it and feed power into the system. Scrounge up old Ma Bell phones, might have to have a couple of people be operators. Probably have to be constant on system, just pick up your hand and go? I don’t know much about electronics so it is only conjecture on my part.
Thought you might like this NCS:
Fry and Jefferson Map of Virginia
http://contemporarymakers.blogspot.com/2016/04/fry-and-jefferson-map-of-virginia.html
The contemporary craftwork and colonial artifacts on here are sublime. I can spend hours just looking at the fine artistry and industrial efforts gone into these folks work. It is inspiring beyond words. But some of these rifles these guys are making, wow. Mind blowing beautiful.
http://contemporarymakers.blogspot.com
There is a post with George Washington’s first inaugural address:
http://contemporarymakers.blogspot.com/2016/04/george-washingtons-first-inaugural.html
Brother, that’s a beautiful piece of history, but more importantly, thanks for pointing out that blog. Man, those guys have crafted some true art. The tiger maple on that Elisha Bull pistol is truly beautiful.
Oh ya my pleasure, glad you like it. Spread it around if you don’t care, this is where we have to go if we are to not only survive, but thrive the globalists. This is the basis of liberty and self sufficiency, I say that because I think it is so fundamental and timeless, never mind the traditional and tribal nature of such economic, industrial and artistic freedom. In its truest form, there are little to no dependencies on the industrialized corporate serfdom of monopolistic grip on commodities and technology. It is beautiful stuff for a myriad of noble and sustaining reasons. Timeless, but of an age long over due for a reformation and renascence. Like our primal God gifted liberty. It is all so wonderfully intertwined. I’m working towards it myself. I’m beginning to be a contemporary maker, I was in my teens and twenties, but got myself be waylaid, but its back to it. Getting a forge reset up, sourcing local materials and supplies as much as possible, garnering the shared interest of like minded people in my AO, it is really become an essential element of self determination as all the more mainstream aspects of preps, actually more so if you look far ahead into the holistic venture of sustainability.
Scroll back, you will see things that leave you speechless. These folks are literally an art and craftwork underground. Personally I think they blow just about everything considered “art” out of the water, because if for only one reason, this is art that you use and it is created to last as long as it is cared for and cherished, generationally. In my mind, this is liberty writ large what these folks are creating, more than just beloved objects, its creative freedom my friend. How unfettered free economy and creation of goods is probably the most essential element of liberty. It is real wealth creation, it is prosperity and is intrinsic happiness.
I linked it to the sidebar…agreed 100% and then some. Survival is entirely about sustainability, vs. hoarding/”prepping”. Although I do hoard old timey stuff….
But yes, that blog is full of amazing stuff. Thank you very, very much for linking it.
Free minds think alike right?
Really delighted you like it.
You know, you can see it, the dirt people in our country are beginning to cotton to what matters most in a way that changes everything. It is a little here, and a bit over there, and it is on the threshold of cascade preference. That’s grass roots Brother. As it has always been through history, it is the dirt people who have ever changed things for the better. Time and time again the dirt people have saved humanity from its worst attributes and tendencies. So it is today. It is that determined indomitable tiny plurality that has committed revolution in all its ways, where that revolution has defeated tyranny. I think somehow it is truly evolutionary in nature. Somehow it seems to me, for all the tribulations we face, us who are free in our hearts and our minds, the trials we are facing, for all the portent of terrible possibilities, they pale in the face of and are a beneficial foil to our freedom and how we learn to live liberty. We are still learning liberty. You look at the reformation, the French Indian wars, how Liberty began to grow its grass roots, and the interlude years between up to the war of independence, how it was this incredible learning curve, that incredible document of declaration of rejection of tyranny, then the interceding of encroachment of administrative tyranny when the Fabian’s gave cause leading to another defiant act of secession, the South seceding, and the terrible tribulation of the war of northern aggression, and its aftermath of “reconstruction”, liberty and the virtues/principles of sovereign rights of man never dimmed, but ebbed and flowed, always an undercurrent of agrarianism, even as statism and the money changers dream of one world order began to cloak this land, the fundamental truths of primal freedoms have never been extinguished, nor do I believe they ever can be, but it is these contrasts between totalitarianism/globalism and the jeffersonian agrarianism, as they become more contrasting, which is a catalyst for the natural evolution of liberty and exercise of primal God granted rights of men. That is action. It is motive power. It runs in the blood, tradition, indomitable in a way like nothing else in the sphere of human activity.
I have come to love the South, it’s ways and it’s people. I’m a Northern NH yankee, and that breed of free people, separate from the marxist meddlers and statist up there, what are seen and spit upon as “white trash red necks”, not unlike the “white trash hillbillies” of the south, despised by Yankeedom’s foul chattering classes and intelligentsia, or our western rancher counterparts, the great farming tribes of the plains, we are the only thing holding things together, we are the bedrock of society, steadfast people, and when we decide, when we choose to defy and resist, whether by quiet evolution or violent revolt, that hubris and arrogance that the statists believe is their magic wand they wave over flyover country and sprinkle some magic fairy dust of control, their septor of omnipotant rule, well that evolution its akin to what John Adams said:
“The Revolution was effected before the War commenced. The Revolution was in the minds and hearts of the people; a change in their religious sentiments of their duties and obligations. This radical change in the principles, opinions, sentiments, and affections of the people, was the real American Revolution.” –John Adams, 1818
Once begun it couldn’t be stopped, it has never been stopped, this inexorable resistance to tyranny. And it takes a myriad of forms. It’s not just our rifles and our reluctance to employ them that makes it so formidable. It runs much deeper and encompasses so much of what makes us free in our hearts and minds and the lives we choose and how we live. It is all those things, and more. I think folk art, folk industry, that minimalist productivity, that employs the gifts of God and nature, pays tribute in a most humble but celebratory fashion to that nature within us who are indomitable free souls, who live so free nothing can conquer us.