Railfan Radio Problems

It's not unknown for railfans to have possession of radios that are capible of transmitting on railroad frequencies. Unfortunately, from time to time railroads are plagues with unauthorized interferance on their radios. A few people can give railfans a bad name.

During the last year or so, one individual has been calling trains, blocking tower communications and generally causing problems with radio transmissions.

The LIRR, with the FCC has made one arrest in Nassau and it appears that several other offenders have been identified.

Please use your head. What someone may feel is harmless can be viewed as a major, intentional act of sabatoge. When all arrests are made and the information appears in the paper, lets hope that none of these people identify themselves as "railfans".

Clem

Clem:

Anbody who is calling trains, towers, etc ... is jeopardizing the saftey of crews and passengers as well as being guilty of the things that you mention in your post.

I have to presume (and sure hope) that a railfan certainly would be interested in "scanning" the radios, but not to make illegal transmissions on radios.

It's unfortunate that when they executed the warrant on the guy arrested, they found his room full of railroad stuff, some of which was stolen.

Seems the FCC located the vicinity of the signal with their van, the FBI went through resumes at the LIRR and asked some neighborhood people about rail buffs and were led right to the house. They executed the warrant in the early morning hours, found the radio, timetables and other technical data. Would be sad if they tried the case to look like this guy was planning some sort of destruction, when he was simply being a retard.

Last week they were plying through more employment resumes for addresses that match the other two suspects.

It's unfortunate that this guy, and probably the two or three others in are being monitored will probably be branded with a felony conviction so early in life.

Clem

Hi Clem, BMC,

I hope the idiots don't turn out to be amateur radio operators, (HAMS)! Many of the amateur VHF handhelds and mobiles can be modified to operate on RR frequencies - the potential is there. It will be a dark day in the communities of both hobbies if that's the way it turns out. If they're amateur licensed, the FCC can have a real field day with them - they should know better!

de Don, n2qhvRMLI

As hams, and Don is knowingly on it as well as my father, if you know the PL #, then you can transmit on that particular frequency as well as the input of that repeater. If you don't know that, then forget it. Knowingly when I go on my railfanning ventures, I only use a scanner to hear what goes on, but under any circumstances, I don't share anything with anyone since in ways it is illegal to do that. I can keep it to myself, but never to others. I do feel very sorry for those who did get arrested, but in ways surely those didn't use their heads in doing what they did.

Clem wrote:It's unfortunate that when they executed the warrant on the guy arrested, they found his room full of railroad stuff, some of which was stolen.

Seems the FCC located the vicinity of the signal with their van, the FBI went through resumes at the LIRR and asked some neighborhood people about rail buffs and were led right to the house. They executed the warrant in the early morning hours, found the radio, timetables and other technical data. Would be sad if they tried the case to look like this guy was planning some sort of destruction, when he was simply being a retard.

Last week they were plying through more employment resumes for addresses that match the other two suspects.

It's unfortunate that this guy, and probably the two or three others in are being monitored will probably be branded with a felony conviction so early in life.

Clem

That is tragic indeed. And since some of his RR parphernaila was stolen, then coupling that to the illegal radio activity, I'm willing to bet he faced long odds in trying to convince the authorities that he wasn't plotting any sort of destruction, or in the employ of any terrorist organizations, while simultaneously attempting to sell himself honestly as just a kid who takes railfanning a little too seriously. Dangerously so, in fact. What was he trying to prove?

unfortunately programmable radios exist, and are relatively easy to use. Its abuse like this that can make railfans look like total idiots, and give us an even worse reputation. In this case, it is a rail-hater, I can't imagine anyone who likes trains who would want to create sabatage like this. You can expect it to carry terrorist charges even if they don't stick.