I have searched and searched but I cannot find in writing direction on how many high sites one comms watchstander can monitor. Is there a limit? At what point do you have two comms watchstanders at a sector? We are going from 5 to 8 high sites this year.

There is nothing in writing. The matter is much more complicated than the simple terms you put it in. The number of sites is not as relevant as the number of TX/RX. A typical legacy VHF site has one transceiver and one receiver. A typical R21 VHF site has 4 transceivers. So, a legacy site equals 3 sensors and a R21 site can equal 8. Call volume is another significant consideration. We are looking in to each Sector and have a fair amount of billets in the pipeline to come aboard with R21.

Well I know in Juneau we had bukoo high sites....We had to keep them turned up REAL loud when we vacummed the hard tile floor .....the good ol' days. I miss Pel Meni's

We had around 8 or more just on VHF....Not counting HF..May I ask why you're wondering if there's a reg about this? Just curious....

I'll hazzard a guess for him. He is at one of the Sectors that is a combination of multiple Groups and is inheriting R21 equipment. The SFO is moving over to the SCC soon. There are concerns there (and here) about doing it the right way.

R21 not only increases the total amount of sensors, but in most cases has also improved the sensitivity of the sensors. It also adds more info, such as LOPs with every rx. It is a bit scarry!

You hit the nail on the head Master Chief. I am one of the civilian SAR Controllers at a Sector (look at my profile). The command center at SFO is going to shut down and come here. We are already discussing having two OUC's on watch because of the workload but the big question is how many comms watchstanders we will have and is there guidance on the "span of control" for comms.

It seems to me that having 8 RFF sites with multiple sensors plus HF guards is an incredible amount of information coming at a relatively junior person for 12 hours. Especially in a port as busy as this one is.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: medicjm,

I have been wondering that myself Master Chief. Down here at Sector Miami we have a good amount of traffic and cases coming over the RDO. With the addition of R21 and everything I have heard about it, seems to me the 1 CIU might be swapped. We are getting 4 new billets for OS3 which to me seems that they came to us for the R21 and might be just for doubling up the watch. If that's the case.... only 4? Should be at lease 5, so if someone gets sick, leave, training, injured, etc... They would still be able to cover the watch.

The Coast Guard still thinks about this the wrong way. You all need to wear headsets and get rid of the blasted speakers. You are ruining your hearing and all of you should be on the hearing conservation program...

Watch positions, for example:

1. Channel 16 ONLY (rotate around between watch standers every two hours)
2. Off 16 SAR -- ch 22 combined with CG working, 23, 21, 83a.
3. LE/phones.
4. Controller

Instead of small sector comms this type of watch standing set up should be a larger, regional command centers, I propose 10 of 'em, and combine a much, much larger pool of watch standers with expanded watch positions so that individual radio duties can be appropriately segregated.

There is no way any of you can efficiently work given what Rescue 21 is giving you.

quote:

The Coast Guard still thinks about this the wrong way. You all need to wear headsets and get rid of the blasted speakers. You are ruining your hearing and all of you should be on the hearing conservation program...

Right on Dan!

Over the years, I have grown tired of listening to VA doctors and audiologists ask why I didn't wear hearing protection while in the Coast Guard. Shows how much they know (or don't). Right now, 15 years after retiring, if I were to be standing across the street from an exploding dynamite factory, I probably would notice. The damage to my audiatory nerves is well beyond repair and the tenitis will be around for the rest of my life. Imagine listening to a FM radio that is not tuned in to a station. All you hear is static. That's a good description of the "ringing" in my ears brought on by tinitis caused by this damage.

Oh, and historically, I wonder how many lives have been lost because the radio watchstander was out of the shack, cutting, waxing and buffing the outside passagway during a mid-watch and couldn't hear a faint distress signal.

Hopefully, that is not the case anymore. But at one time, the Coast Guard did have its priorities and then, appearance was EVERYTHING.

mw

VHF Hi-sites - 9
HF Hi-sites - 3
COMMS WS - 2
OUC (aka SAR Controller) - 1
SITCON (aka ) - 1
Having two command centers crammed into a room made for one - priceless!

quote:

Instead of small sector comms this type of watch standing set up should be a larger, regional command centers, I propose 10 of 'em, and combine a much, much larger pool of watch standers with expanded watch positions so that individual radio duties can be appropriately segregated.

Master Chief,

Although I think this idea could work in theory, I'd have to say, working at Sector Miami, and watching everything thing that is going on in Key West, there's no way they could pull off one Sector in Florida. If you had watch standers at one Sector in FL, then hearing loss wouldn't be the problem to worry about. You'd have watch standers dropping like flies from fatigue. The op tempo for that one Sector in FL would be mad crazy and if you expected people to work in that type of enviorment for a 4 years billet that would never work out. Now now I know what's coming, they would account for that and give ample watch standers to cover the watch. Lets say they give so much everyone gets 2 on 4 off, which according to our rating force MC shouldn't happen as a regular schedule, but lets dream and say they do... I don't know your back ground but as far as my experience, you'll never get all your watch standers qualed at the same time, so even if 100 percent billets were full, you wouldn't have 100 percent standing alone watches. I don't even want to go into, people getting masted, losing clearances, prego, sick, and any other reason you can think of. Basicly, you would be buring out coasties. Hey, that might be a great way to get our Bonus back tho, cause I could only imagine how many OS's after doing the Sector tour for all of FL, would say, I hate the CG, screw you Iam going home!!! Combining Sectors kinda would fall into the CG thought of LETS DO MORE WITH LESS!!

Just my 2 cents MC. I like the idea for the rest of the CG but FL and CALI? Probably wouldn't work right.

Yes, I do think it could work, and yes, the optempo can be offset by additional watchstanders. When channel 16 optempo picks up, you simply "peel off" an additional watch stander guard to parse channel 16 guard further. If you are overcome with SAR working, you assign another watch stander, or two, or three, to keep up with the pace. The idea is built behind two theories.

1) Watch standers must be assigned to watches that can serve the MAXIMUM op tempo, just like phone trunks can serve a MAXIMUM number of telephone circuits.

2) Watch stations, i.e. positions, are configurable, through your GUI, in accordance with the type of watch you are standing. If you are on a 16 guard then all you can do is listen and talk on channel 16. If it is overwhelming a second watch stander configures his/her watch position to do the same thing, and takes some of the "load" for you.

Now, watch schedules are a different animal. You need to be able to accomodate your circadian rhythm and the traditional Coast Guard watch schedule doesn't allow for that, and, hence, is taking years off your life.

The minimum, I say again, minimum, rotational shift should be 8 hour watches of the same time during the day for at least one month, and then you slide to the next 8 hours for the next month, and so on, just like your fellow 911 operators do.

You can even approach optempo differently. If you know that during certain times of the year optempo is large then you need to schedule for it and make sure you have enough watch standers to do it.

A watch center for Florida would need, at a minimum, 10 watch standers on one shift to keep up with optempo. I know, I did the study on it. If you combine all OSs in Florida to one command center you can make it work.

The next argument is area fam, and my counter is that virtually none of you watch standers have visited or even seen the "holes" where people can't be found. Your charts will suffice if Rescue 21 DF is all it's cracked up to be.

Also, this isn't a new idea. The Maritime Coastguard Agency has been doing this for years, and guess what....they are better at SAR than you.

Let me summarize this....

10 configurable watch positions with a controller as the OOD.

The watch positions can serve any of the 4 functions, including a 5th function of automating broadcasts to coincide with the Lantarea Annex K, or PAC if that is your flavor.

The watch positions are configured by the graphic user interface....channel 16, SAR working, LE working, etc., and you can only perform those functions because that is all the individual interfaces will allow you to do. If you need to configure to an additional channel 16 guard you change the user interface.

The watch captain can oversee all watch positions and transceive on any of them.

Just one more thing to add...

I wrote a paper on this in late 2001 after 9/11 and after visiting the MCA in England earlier that year. and it was distributed widely throughout HQ. I even presented it to the appropriate Admirals and Captains, breaking down watch requirements. I was the TC force manager at the time. It isn't a new idea. As a matter of fact, a D7 officer plagiarized my paper and sent it to HQ a few years later.

As has been mentioned, there are more billets coming on line to assist those Sectors that really need it.
Edgy and I have had a lot of discussions on this topic. As he mentioned, he was the TC RFMC until JRR took affect. You'll see there are a lot of similarities between what we say, and a few differences. I am not convinced that headphones are a good idea. Probably the biggest reason is that the CU needs to communication with real live people while monitoring their freqs. How a multi person watch is broke up (Geo or Freq) can change based on circumstances.

Another thing edgy and I have a different perspective on is issues like area fam. Take a second and find out haw many 'Seal Rocks' are in California and Oregon. See how many may be close. Although LOPs help this a great deal, there are still benifits to knowing area knowledge.

Dan - thanks for putting out great discussion points!

Area Fam is required by STAN Team, not just once per PCS but once a year. You'd have to get those regs changes. Also I still am not convinced that the customer service would remain the same. Knowing your local PD, Fire department, EMS all helps to get er done. You state 10 watch standers for FL, we currently have 5 standing watch and sometimes get over whelemed, not just SAR, LE, Homeland Security, AMIO, Pollution and just about anything else under the tree. As for our busy time of year.... it last 365 days. If your telling me we can double our watch standers and run the whole state of FL I would disagree with you. Statement you state as is, if you get overwhelmed, just add another watch stander... Ummm I'd love to do that now but I don't have watch standers to pull, we'd need alot more OS's. Kinda sounds like your want to make all the Sectors into new districts.

Silly,

Just change your mindset a little....

To make a big command center work we need to measure actual traffic, which includes alert time, rest time, actively working, etc. A study like this was done in 1990, and helped to determine how many watch standers were needed at Groups. The study became a shelf baby because the Coast Guard didn't want to buy bodies.

In terms of changing regulations, happens all the time. The JRR force managers made the rules up as we went along. We had no book to tell us how to merge ratings for 8000 people. Who do you think put together the JRR SWE stuff? The word "ME" is right in the middle of Nesemeier, and there were two other MCs who worked helped to flesh it out.

This is all possible given the right manpower and the right amount of study. I propose 10 per watch, it could be more, and if it is the Coast Guard ought to pony up and fund the billets.

In the box thinking is what is keeping you all on 12 hour watches. There are dozens of ways to skin the cat, and the more of you who talk it up and share the information the better the message is heard at HQ.

Concerning headsets...

Does the FAA listen to speakers or headsets when they monitor runways? The answer is the latter.

Do 911 operators listen to speakers or headsets? Visit the one nearest you for ideas about how they operate.


I have a slide show with pics from my MCA visit. If the watch stations are set up correctly both verbal and non-verbal communication are possible because the watch positions are situated in a large U. There aren't skyscraper positions. Every watch stander can look over their monitor and see the watch stander across from them and next to them.
Phil, let's have some lunch, OUTSIDE of the HQ building, if you please, and I'll give you a copy of what I have.

This is all completely possible!

Another thing to consider.

The Fairfax County 911 system is operated in one command center not too far from me. The population of Fairfax County is 1,037,311.

Fair comparison? In some ways yes, others no, but they handle a heck of a lot more calls than all Sectors in D7 daily.

Dan - sounds like a plan to me. I think I still have some of the stuff you gave me before. On the road rest of the week, I'll get in touch next week.

Wow I think that is a lame idea. Are we just made of money to blow. All of our billets are going to then be in huge cities where traffic is horrible and housing is few and far between.

On the headset idea, good idea. However you need to realize that we have to answer phones and talk to people while we listen to the radios, my sector, personally has 11 highsites. So are there going to be 11 little blinky lights on the headset that will tell me which highsite the specific noise is coming from.

So the controller will be an OOD as well. Great idea..... wrong. So while I am running a sar case I will look out the window and see a boat mooring up and go help with that and then i will go plow the snow out of the parking lot and still have time to catch up on all my documentation.

Just my opinions.

I believe you misunderstood the intent/idea of "OOD." I don't think it was meant as 'base OOD' but as 'head-dude(ette) in charge of the watch.'

By the way, with R21, you loose the one-to-one speaker/highsite guard relationship. (Much to my dismay)