Welcoming committee meets Mitch and Matt as they deliver E286

Campo's new Ford F550 by Ferrara Fire Apparatus. Built with last years CDBG grant this new 4x4 will replace our well used Brush 86.

Follow this link to see all of our engines.

November 15, 2004. Once again Campo Fire and Rescue has been awarded a grant from the Fireman's Fund Heritage. This grant for $11,400 will be used to purchase three additional, 800Mhz, Trunking, Hand Held Radios. Our current seven, early model analog, handhelds, are getting long in the tooth. These new analog/digital handhelds will improve our ability to stay in touch with our firefighters and incident commanders. To learn more about our new Motorola Handhelds follow this link to Motorola. To learn more about the San Diego County, Regional Communications System, used by our department follow this link to the RCS. Please follow these links to learn more about Fireman's Fund Heritage and the Fireman's Insurance Company.

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Fireman's Fund Insurance Company

April 1, 2004 (not an April Fools!) Sally Custenborder, next to Mitch and Kelly Greene, next to Geoff, representatives of the Fireman's Insurance Company, travel to Campo to announce their award of a grant to purchase two Self-Contained Breathing Apparatus (SCBA) and four spare one hour air tanks.

2003 The Campo crew put the new, grant purchased, turnouts and breathing apparatus to use at a local trailer fire at the Motor Transport Museum on Highway 94.The trailer belonged to a visiting friend of Campo old-timers and a fellow Amateur Radio Operator. He is fine.

The CDF crew naturally poked fun at the crews brand new duds but as one of our lovely female CDF Firefighters was present they all were gentlemen. ( As are we all here in the back country.) We also recently received a small grant from the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) To purchase new fire shelters, and brush fire hose nozzles.

In November 2002 the County of San Diego granted funds to Campo Fire to upgrade our VHF radio systems. The photo to the right shows our ceremonial check and one of our seven new Kenwood TK-280 portable radios purchased with the grant. The Kenwood TK-280 is a 5 watt, VHF Transceiver capable of 250 banks of 250 channels. The Campo Fire units are programmed to communicate with all VHF agencies in Southern California. Additionally, the units can be re-programmed by the department as our needs change. (Special thanks to our Supervisor Diane Jacob.)

The photo to the left shows the cab of Brush 86 with it's new Kenwood TK-790 VHF mobile radio. (The one right under the dash.) Five radios were purchased as part of the grant. The Kenwood TK-790 is a 45 watt, VHF, vehicle mounted transceiver. Like the TK-280's the mobile radios are programmed by the department with programmers purchased as part of the grant and computer equipment donated by our Support Unit. San Diego County, State, and Federal agencies have an interesting mix of communications systems. San Diego County RCS All the city fire departments, paramedics, and volunteer fire departments in our area, including Campo Fire, are dispatched on the San Diego County, 800 Mhz trunking system. One of our Motorola 800Mhz radios is mounted below the Kenwood in the photo to the left. In addition to the mobile radios in all our vehicles we have six Motorola portable radios. San Diego County maintains our 800 Mhz equipment but to save money from our massive, $16,600.00 annual budget we take care of installations in the vehicles. (Please keep those donations coming.) San Diego also maintains a number of Disaster and OES frequencies in the VHF band. California Division of Forestry and the US Forest Service. Back here in "far east county" we are involved in mutual aid with these state and federal fire departments. Their main radio systems are on VHF frequencies, thus this update project. Prior to the Kenwoods we had 16 channel radios and could only communicate on the basic channels. Now we have them all and can be more helpful in our mutual aid role.

A special thanks to Williams Tel Data and Eric Williams for re-wiring our telephone system during our radio and computer upgrade project. Now we even have a FAX line, number on the webpage main page.