Table of Contents
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Table of Contents
2001 November |
Selected
Articles from the Current IssueOn our Cover
By Bob Kozlarek
On September 11, the World Trade Center towers were demolished by
terrorists using hijacked commercial planes as missiles. Among the horrified
onlookers was the author, watching and listening from his location in Northern
New Jersey. He reports public safety communications worked remarkably well
considering the circumstances and the fact that a good proportion of the cities'
broadcast and communications systems had been located atop the WTC.
In a twist of irony, the author was working on a communications story for
MT about the World Trade Center when it was first bombed in 1993. This
time, the city wasn't so fortunate. See the full story plus federal and local
frequencies for the on-going rescue and recovery efforts.
Photos on our cover and in the article are by Mike Coppola, Unit 301 of
Metro Fire Radio, a two-way radio notification group.
By
Alan Henney
As the nation's capital struggled to grasp the enormity of what was
happening in New York City, Washington experienced tragedy first-hand as a plane
crashed and exploded into the Pentagon. The author notes that here, as in NYC,
communications ability had greatly improved since the area's last major
disaster. Listed are federal and local frequencies expected to remain active.
Photos by Bob Pugh of BlindSpot News Services.
By
John Mayson
Many U.S. interstates offer great scenery to entertain travelers;
Interstate 20 is not one of them. Scanner buffs have another way to help the
miles pass more quickly and stay awake: listening to public safety comms. Here
is a guide to frequencies in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama, plus some tips
to programming your scanner ahead of time so you can keep your eyes on the road.
By
Dr. John Catalano
Last month Dr. John looked at the evolution of radio theory. Now he turns
to the technology most critical to the radio of the present and future – the
growth of computer technology. He also interviews Bob Grove about radio trends,
and does some speculating of his own about the radio of 2010.
In the first of two parts, John Catalano looks at software to control the
do-everything BC 780XLT Trunk Tracker. This month he compares Scanner Master's WinScan
780 by Pozilla Software and TrunkStar780 by Signal Intelliegence
(makers of the ScanStar products) (p.82).
In the final installment of our series on mobile shortwave listening, Ken
Reitz looks at preassembled and kit-built converters for your car radio,
especially the LFB 4-Band Converter and the Ramsey Converter.
Sources are also given for converters from MFJ and Vectronics. Ken
also summarizes the strong and weak points of all the alternatives discussed in
this series – and throws in a new option for good measure: satellite radio
(p.84).
Bob Grove reviews several pieces of radio equipment this month: an
inexpensive Sangean pocket portable receiver, a more affordable spectrum
display unit from Avcom Ramsey, and an AM broadcaster filter for VLF
listeners from PAR Electronics (p.87).
English Lang SW Guide compiled by the MT Monitoring Team: Gayle Van Horn, Frequency Manager; Mark Fine, Frequency Monitor; John Figliozzi, Program Manager