You're passion, preparation, and knowledge in this hobby is unmatched. Awesome job.

As a UK police officer, in my experience Airwave has for the most part been fairly adequate. On occasion the comms can be extremely poor however. Many of the cars in the service I'm in used to be fitted with "Gateway" mode using DMO rather than TMO, whereby the radio handsets an officer might use with a lower power output would relay to the TETRA network via a more powerful transmitter in the vehicle. This was useful in an underground car park if the vehicle was left outside on the street for instance, but had line of sight to the mobile handsets. Unfortunately they seem to have removed the "Gateway" button on the DIN panel in all of the cars over the last few years, and I wonder if the Gateway system is even still active, back during my training in 2016 (as a special constable) and then 2017 as a full time PC - we weren't even taught anything about Gateway mode, nor how to use it. Having been to numerous hospitals there have been plenty of near misses involving a lack of comms coverage in the hospitals, some parts of the hospital receive no coverage at all and others do. The part you read about the force being charged per second is true, when I joined as a probationer officers used to call each other for the sake of it, or to discuss trivial matters. It quickly came to light by supervisors who reminded us that each transmission costs money, whether that be a point to point call or a transmission across the whole talk group. As for the "Roger, so far" part - we recently had an officer transfer to us from a county force, he used this terminology a lot and none of us understood why he was doing it, until he explained it. He quickly stopped doing it as radio comms in the force I'm in are more casual. I've only ever had to press the "red button" once in my 7 years of service. It's laughably called the "Chicken button" by people I used to work with!

I worked for Airwave for 8 years during the rollout and testing. Had a lot of fun, quite a bit of airborne Air Ambulance air to ground testing, 75,000 miles in two years in a company Land Rover Defender and a memorable 47 hour straight working day when we had an issue once.

Every time a unit transmits, a unit ID is sent, even Baofeng has this feature. Everything is recorded and timestamped somewhere. There is a kill signal to disable stolen radios, along with other features.

In Norway, hand terminals are 2.5 watts and car terminals are 10 watts, we also use the tetra system. like that RW pd logo

Lost radios are a huge problem and the procedures don't work. Initially (2007-2011) the Met alone thought they were losing about 200 a year until a bulk audit showed it was more like 350. More recently in 2022 the lost figure was 1,100 of which 742 turned up so a net 360 and we'll have to see whether another audit finds more gone.

Thanks for the video. As a government radio engineer on a P25 TDMA system here in the US, i enjoyed learning about how things are done in the UK.

Best investigator and elucidation I have ever experienced on Utube 👌

Tetra made me go straight after I could not use scanners any more! It was fun listening to 451.575 on the weekend 😉if ya know ya know😂😂

Fantastic video, really enjoyed that. Thank you. As a sort of side note, if anyone is worried about the security angle of these transmitters and revealing their location, I can assure you that if you attempt to tamper with one of these sites you will get one hell of a surprise.

"Up the cycle track" got a bit annoying but very good otherwise. Thanks

Awesome Lewis Nice Job 73

the bit on resilience made me smile and automatically the thought "not a hope" popped into my head :)

I'm not sure Lewis but I think this is your best video yet! Great job!👍

I love the new channel logo 😎

Great work as always Lewis, brilliant mate. Hope all is well with you, Smoggie, etc...

Thank's for the video Lewis! 🙂

Thank you for this very detailed and interesting video. Well done!

Very interesting thanks Lewis!

Great video as always Lewis 👍

A quick look at the society around me and i conclude that 'national security' was a concept eroded into non existence during the period 1945 to the end of the so called cold war. I enjoy your videos, thank you.

Fascinating stuff and as thorough and well-researched as always. My Dad worked for the Home Office Directorate of Telecommunications (latterly DTeLS) and was heavily-involved in the planning, provision and improvement of the legacy VHF and UHF schemes used by Police, Fire and 'others'. There were a number of quite innovative solutions employed for getting the most out of the old analogue system which whilst clunky, did work well. It's a shame we can't listen in anymore but I think that's likely for the best these days...

I am a radio amateur for almost 50 years - thank you very much, very interesting to me. 🌷 Willi,DL9WR 😊

Knutsford? The mental image of that is the Jolly Green Giant laying in a river, legs open with little vikings pulling their ship by a chain up and across him. Later on shore, wiping the sweat from their brow, one exclaims "We will raise our families 'ere, beside these nuts we had to ford."

never clicked so fast 13 seconds upload thx RM :)

Super interesting. Another stellar video bud.

someone watching this video looking for threats to national security 😅

Great video !!! Learning quite a bit from your work my friend !

We had mobile gateways in the Met. Maybe one or two cars on the borough which had two radios in them to use as a gateway. The instructions to set them up looked complex and I don’t know if any being used personally If there is an Airwave issue , Airwave have Mercedes Vito vans and Landrovers with radio kit and pump up masts on them to deploy to an area. There are photos about of the vehicles which have blue lights on them too. I can point you in the direction of them

Thanks for this one Lewis I found it interesting. I have a remote Tetra site a few miles from where I live. I have had a good walk round it many times.

The system didn't work that well at Grenfell for the Fire Service. A noisy analogue signal is better than no digital signal at all!!!!

I (think) I can break down that cover image to this video. Its not so secret because there is a big ass antenna sticking out, but in the US a building that size generally doesn't require a permit to build. Its not as secret as it is... budget friendly.

As someone who works at Vodafone I find this information super interesting. I hope to progress my career into managing 1 of the key critical infrastructure accounts which we look after at my company.

Very interesting video Lewis. I do find the UK now seems to be the most Secretive Country in the Western World. It shows how sad those in charge really are. We have more CCTV per square mile than most places in the US. I could never really understand why the UK Authorities put a stop to Emergency Services monitoring. It was harmless fun. Some Police Officers I knew at the time they switched over, said they knew who the hobbyists were, and the criminal sort. They said that they found the hobbyists to be helpful in certain incidents, and said they couldn't understand the Authorities stance on making everything Secretive. Go to America and you can hear almost everything, from Police to Secret Service. They are more open over there. One Police Officer I spoke to said that our Governments must have a guilty conscience, and a lot to hide. In my role of Emergency Communications Operator with Civilian group I have worked with many Emergency Services personnel over the years.

On YT are some of the late 1970s /80s documentary "Scotland Yard" a couple of episodes covered the Flying Squad on a stakeouts - although filmed for TV there was a lot of radio traffic - which presumably was encrypted. At one point they were worried the gang had a scanner for picking up radio comms (was it encrypted then?) they also moaned at times "The Voda's arent working" which presumably was a Vodaphone network - mobile phone ?

The Olympic Park Radio Control Centre was located at Project Park, North Crescent, just off Cody Road Canning Town, all equipment including Tower have been removed after the Olympics

In Belgium its called "Astrid" (All-round Semi-cellular Trunking Radio) and in the Netherlands "c2000".

We also use Tetra radios on the power grid. If the power goes out, most mobile masts will go out also. However tetra radios can be used in the event of a black start as the stations are fitted with backup generators

Thanks RM. Very Cool Video****

Just like the 800 mhz systems in the US. When you turn on your Motorola APX radio. It is constantly sharing data with the repeater sites. To include what you are doing on the radio. When you key up the mic, your radio 4 digit code flashes across the dispatchers console along with every radio on that channel. They can even be GPS tracked if you are down or the radio gets lost. If the radio gets stolen, it can be "bricked" remotely the next time it is turned on and tries to shake hands with the system.

In Australia, any transmitter site can be found on the acma's site locator site, its really handy for finding the P25 Trunked NSW PSN Network sites and any site I want to find ^^

An interesting difference between commercial cellular and (this) TETRA implementation is the utilization of receiver diversity. The reason why three stacked (collinear) antennas are used in a 120 degree configuration is because it gives several dB “equivalent” of gain in urban areas where multipath is the main cause of signal degradation. In cellular, 120 degree sectors are used for capacity, and they use 3 highly directional panel antennas per sector, unlike here, where three omnidirectional antennas are used. Historically, transmit was done on a fourth centrally placed collinear omnidirectional antenna.

I use Airwaves as a paramedic. I didn't know a tenth of this information ha ha. I know that any lost or stolen radio can be "stunned" so that it fails to connect to any talk group, and this can be done remotely.

Hey Lewis. Great video and great drone work as always. I seem to recall that airwave can also be used for data purposes albeit a very low speeds. I guess this is one of the reasons the government are now looking to replace airwave with the EE LTE based solution.

Ahh talk of the ESN network...... will it ever happen 🤣🤣🤣

Cheers Lewis. :-)

Thank you ! 👍

Ahhh tetra... Great in theory... a problem in practice. I've inherited ~150 radios from the tetra network that was shut down in my country a couple years ago (a couple other hams have the hoards of radios from their cities)... So many sites, so little coverage. DMR and P25 are taking over with good reason... They don't offer FDX calling... but as it turns out, that's less important than being able to actually communicate.

Fantastic level of information, and love the footage. That surprised me about the use whilst driving too. Could it be to do with high speed driving, or just general covering their backs? Now, if they had some kind of mesh network...

I worked in a BTP control room, we had PC touch-screen radios, but used handhelds & mainsets when there was a failure, they didn't happen much luckily. I was a radio op (a dispatcher to our US friends) during the London Underground suicide attacks on 07/07/2005 (and again during the failed 21/07/2005 attack, and then all though the crime scene investigations). At that time, LU officers carried 2 radios, a Sepura Airwave and an underground leaky feeder radio (we called then "Channel 2 radios). Shortly after the incidents, Airwave provided vehicles at Russell Square and Liverpool Street/Aldgate, that ran cables down to the underground to give officers and SOCO Airwave capability (I guess they were mobile repeaters). We could "point to point" (PTP) officers direct using their radio numbers and officers to/from each other for private calls. They're pretty much like DMR radios available to us Hams.

Thanks for this overview, very interesting! I have been told that the vehicle mobile sets act as a "Repeater" for rhe officer(s) assigned to that car. Given the low power handheld and presumably the higher power car sets, this would seem to be a sensible set up. As a Ham, I have been asked about this by friends who assume that I am an expert on all things radio! Looking forward to more about these "official" networks. 73 Jim M7BXT

Great stuff. Ever thought about covering GSMR?

A number of years ago in my radio days I was picking up a repeater from a shop that handled radios for a lot of police agencies in my state. The owner (apparently not seeing me on the premises) was talking to police department about how he had set up a talk group for them on his commercial trunked system. I'm guessing they wanted to stay off the radar of their own system. I wonder if that occurs elsewhere.

TETRA took all the fun away from scanning

Hey! You anticipated the comments being full of claims of breaking nation security but instead, most comments are simply hollering about your new awesome logo!

At its introduction in Finland the personal TETRA radios of ambulance crews were shown to rarely but sometimes interfere with life sustaining medical systems. When the potentially affected and therefore obsoleted medical equipment was quickly replaced, no such problems have occurred. When TETRA replaced the old communications systems, it solved many incompatibility problems between the different emergency services. In addition to voice communications, it offered data services. The communications security of TETRA has been called into question in the preceding decades, and I think the closed source security model is deeply flawed.

yOu’Re CoMpRoMiSiNg NaTiOnAl SeCuRiTy!!!1 Cheers mate, love your videos.

I recall that the olympics airwave system around Weymouth (for the sailing events) was not encrypted.

Many happy days spent installing and repairing in N.I.

Like many of the DMR type handsets, the Supervisor/Inspector or whoever can remotely monitor the microphone of the handset, if they think there's any criminality going on (bent cop, etc).

I loved my old scanner

They actually say "so far" heard it a lot when the local PCSO's are ordering their McDonalds. Obviously not monitored in our area anyway. Someone else said that East Sussex (KB) still have an analogue tx in Lewes - can't find posting anymore. There is no VHF aerial there anymore so not sure about that! By the way Lewes jail has a mobile phone blocker which extends some metres outside their walls. I am told some local properties get a free phone line to compensate. Apparently Wi-Fi is also "difficult" in the area!

That was excellent Lewis! Interesting re portable use in cars. In certain UK Police TV productions showing the Police going after stolen cars, you often see the officer using his vest mounted portable from inside the car. Hardly a great way to ensure a good signal into the network and keep the battery life good when out of the car. Cannot say I have seen an officer in that circumstance use a vehicle mounted radio. But yeah TV and all that.

Lewis, I can't believe you would risk national security like that!! 😂 It's funny to me when people want things to be secret but record it in public records. My favorite example is how (I think it was Massachusetts) mandated fire controls for elevators which theoretically should only be able to be used by firemen. However, in the same regulation, they specified the bitting for the keys. So now anyone who wants their own fire control key for elevators in MA can easily get one made.

I can guarantee 100% this is how things “should be done” as per home office guidelines. But it’s definitely not How things are done. For instance your line manager asking “do you have your radio, do you know where it is” every month they don’t actually check the radio. The pool radios definitely don’t get stored behind 2 locks, that’s not something that will be followed anywhere. I agree there’s some places that have them in locked cabinets but with the Motorola desktop charger being the most common kit for pool radios no one’s locking that huge thing in a cupboard. The network is ancient and flawed. It can’t cope with doing PABX and too many talk groups chatting at once. During events they tell you not to use point to point or PABX to reduce the stress on the network. Most handsets are old, battered and seen better days ( some look like a dog had been let loose with it) the batteries last 1 hour and officers have to keep several batteries in their stab proof vest to keep them warm. They definitely do not say “over” controllers usually say “control out” after a broadcast .

Those Roger beeps are so F annoying

Can you do something like this for the US emergency services. They usually are unencrypted mobile vehicle and portable on oerson hand helds to a central repeater to the dispatch. Hovering around 155mhz and 46mhz. I know there was talk of them going to trunkated signals for years. Havent seen it in my area yet. There is some means of the units identifying themselves since it shows up on a scanner and can be filtered by that.

Very interesting, esp about the hierarchy of the organsation.

The use of personal sets whilst driving isn't necessarily against the Road Traffic Act. Indeed some forces train officers to use these during pursuits.

Amazing video, so much time and research but in to this video

i think that sample was vk control in norfolk, fisher road being in diss and the stolen bike being a cbr600

I found this transmission on 11102 kHz SW at 21:43 Indian time. It was a long beep followed by some Digital mode.

At the current rate, ESN will be out of date when (if) it rolls out Use of handheld devices in vehicles is exempted in road traffic legislation for emergency use, and that includes civilians too. Some devices are covered in legislation simply by frequency, which used to rule out most mobile phones, but not things like ham radio, or tetra. Needless to say, legislation around technology is always far out of date, often badly drafted. The current legislation is based on any "interactive data" which can cover both ham radio and tetra, with the emergency exemption still in place.

Whenever a Radio is stolen they are "Stung" where a signal is sent to them to immediately shut them down and pretty much self-destruct them

You forgot to mention that TETRA radios are run from one Airwave control centre for the UK...how traffic is routed, how the network is managed, how base stations are controlled and what goes on. Also how data is sent between sites and managed.

You say prisons lewis we say holiday camps

I've never heard a police controller say 'over' and only heard them say 'out' on talkgroup circulations. General use is a lot less disciplined than you suggest. In my area at least.

I remember the home Office launch of the Emergcy Services Network project. 'Cheaper, Better, Smarter' I also remember Motorola being investigated to the tune of £1.2b they were due to be paid by the tax payer until 2026...

if anyone wants to tamper with the nearest airwave antenna to my location, they are going to need a forty foot ladder and an invisibility cloak!

Were there any reports about fluffy cats? If not, why not,

Not sure how it is in the UK but some of the larger P25 public service systems in the US operate their own LTE network, typically used for data, so some public services tower sites also use standard sectorized panel antennas as well, these might be confused with belonging to a mobile carrier. Might be possible some of those sites (with the panels) might also be owned by the agency, not actual carrier system.

I used to take my tetra radio with me on remote Scotland canoe trips as the telephone function would work just about anywhere. About 10 years ago this became impossible as the individual users would be billed separately for radios out of area and a radio out of area would stretch the command map out of shape. They are a good bit of kit, many users were worried that the frequency used would cause brain damage. Perhaps they were right.

Obscurity does not ensure security. There have been other talks published here including the hardware required and more but this is interesting before it is surpassed.

that cuckoo-clock sound sure is cheerful

Is Airwaves, linked into HITS (HIGH INTEGRITY TELECOMMUNICATIONS SYSTEM) as per your video a while ago

ESN will already be out of date when it's put into use.

I remember back in the 90s here in Staffordshire when I used to listen to the police, there was someone who would talk back to them and keep winding them up, this went on for quite a long time, I did have some recordings of it will have to dig them out, not sure if they ever got caught, I did ask my parents to keep a eye out in the local papers that they read daily but nothing ever got published about it. Whoever it was knew what they were doing as when they switched channels to avoid the idiot they would be there waiting for them and this was across multiple police stations, I remember they would say like switch to channel 21 and the person would be there as quick as they were.

An explanation regarding a UK Tetra Handset (Government Issue) was never offered/given regarding it's removal from an Amesbury (Wiltshire) Property 2018. Evidence Bag provided 😉👍

In Brussels, in a park, I accidentally filmed a building of a police unit. 2 police officers came up to me and I had to hand over my cellphone +pin code so they could delete the footage !!

I hope they don't upset the blade runners😂

I have no clue how people can understand transmissions that garbled.

I was in the cops for 13 years and never used over or roger so far or active. Just call sign > division/force callsign. Then to close down "received". For longer messages received so far. For priority messages its was always call sign + urgent. Most of what you mention is MET terminology IMO. I also don't understand your comment about not using car sets whilst driving. Overall airwave is actually a very good system, it was introduced a few years after I started and its light years ahead of the old system.

It was due to be EOL a few years ago, but the 4g replacement service radios are still being developed, and (realistically) never going to be at a uaeable state to replace the tetra network. There are multiple forces that have stated the requirements for the replacement aren't nearly enough for what they need. Theres some info out due to FOI requests on this af anybody wants to investigate this further

Hi mike

this was interesting, could you cover the mobile phone network and how that works ?

It would be good if you did a video on the ESN

- 00:03 📡 Overview of Airwave System - Introduction to Airwave, the UK’s emergency services radio network, - Discussion of how Airwave is used and its technical details. - 02:02 🏅 Special Airwave Network for London Olympics - Overview of the Apollo network used during London 2012 Olympics, - Creation of a unique communication infrastructure for the events. - 03:31 🏙 Identifying Airwave Transmitter Sites - Typical setup and locations of Airwave transmitter sites, - How to identify and features of these transmitter sites. - 05:10 🔗 Interconnected Transmitter Sites - Explanation of the layout and connections via microwave links, - Use of overlapping clusters to ensure wide coverage. - 06:08 🕹 Hierarchical Responsibilities within the Police - Different levels of responsibility in maintaining Airwave network, - Detailed roles from head of communications to local terminal administrators. - 11:25 📞 Communication Etiquette on Airwave - Guidelines for precise and accurate communications, - Protocol for using urgent, active, and routine messages. - 14:44 🔌 Direct Mode Operation (DMO) and Gateways - Description of DMO providing direct communication without infrastructure, - Limitations and effectiveness of DMO, plus use of gateways for extending coverage. - 16:29 🚇 Usage in London Underground - Use of Airwave in the London Underground, - Capacity limitations for concurrent conversations in subsurface stations. - 17:00 🚓 Coverage in Vehicles and Coverage Assurance - Coverage issues within vehicles and legal considerations, - Alternatives for communication when network coverage fails. - 18:26💡 Network Resilience and Backup Systems - Resilience measures for maintaining communications during failures, - Redundant systems ensuring network operation during faults.

Radio waves from these are aggressive if you are near by need to completely notch it out with a cavity filter.

Ambulance and fire also use Airwave, I don't think they were mentioned in the list at the start of the video.

Do you know anything about Stream (Scottish company) now owned by ARM hosting SIM cards for the olympics?