PROJ
MGR, DEFENSE COMMUNICATIONS & ARMY TRANSMISSION SYSTEMS (PM
DCATS)
RELEASE NO: 05-12-01
CONTACT: STEPHEN
LARSEN (732) 427-6756  [email-masked]

Alaska Land Mobile Radio system is a template for U.S.
Homeland Security/Homeland Defense communications

By Stephen Larsen

ANCHORAGE, Alaska - Four years after 9-11, Hurricane
Katrina underscored the fact that the same communications problems that
plagued first responders at the World Trade Center and Pentagon are still
plaguing first responders today.

According to members of the 9-11 Commission, if those
problems are not corrected - from malfunctioning radios using different
frequencies, to a lack of an incident command system, to a lack of
communications interoperability between radios used by local, state and
federal agencies - more people will die during responses to future natural
disasters or terrorist acts.

"Hurricane Katrina pointed out serious flaws in our
emergency preparedness and response," said 9-11 Commission member Thomas
Kean, a former Governor of New Jersey. "And what is frustrating to us is
that (these are) many of the same problems we saw in 9-11 and the response
to that disaster."

However, first responder communications can work - and be
interoperable - if federal, state and local agencies work together in
developing an interoperable land mobile radio system, as they did in the
state of Alaska.

First shared infrastructure and spectrum in

the nation

In Alaska - one-fifth the size of the Continental United
States, with a land area sprawling across four time zones - the Alaska
Land Mobile Radio system (ALMR) employs a single, shared-infrastructure
and a spectrum-sharing scheme that makes it available to all federal,
state and local public safety users - the first system of its kind in the
nation.

Photo by Stephen Larsen

The Alaska Land Mobile Radio System (ALMR) employs a
single, shared-infrastructure and a spectrum-sharing scheme that makes it
available to all federal, state and local public safety users - the first
system of its kind in the nation. Shown here, police, firefighter and
emergency medical service personnel use the system on Aug. 18 during a
disaster drill as part of exercise Alaska Shield/Northern Edge 2005.

According to Tim Woodall, the DoD ALMR Program Manager at
Headquarters, Alaskan Command, officials in Alaska took spectrum in the
138 megahertz to 144 megahertz band that primarily belonged to the
Department of Defense and paired it with state and local government public
safety spectrum in the 154.65 megahertz to 156.24 megahertz band to
supports the fixed infrastructure and subscriber and mobile units
operating on the system, creating 120 interoperable channel pairs.

"All fixed repeaters work in the FCC (Federal
Communications Commission) public safety spectrum, and all the mobile and
portable units on the system work in the federal spectrum," said Woodall.
"So what we have matched with every FCC frequency is an NTIA (National
Telecommunications and Information Administration) or federal government
frequency, for a true shared program approach."

Mark Corzine, Project Leader with the Assistant Project
Manager, Land Mobile Radio (APM LMR), said that those 120 channel pairs
are the key to the ALMR system. He explained that prior to ALMR
implementation, Alaskan State Troopers and police, firefighters and
emergency medical service (EMS) personnel in municipalities could
communicate only within in their own talkgroups - however, they could not
communicate with the other agencies.

"Local firefighters could talk to each other, but not to
EMS," said Corzine. "Alaskan State Troopers could talk to each other, but
not to local police - none of them could talk to any other talkgroups but
their own."

Corzine added that the same thing applied at the Federal
level, with agencies such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI),
the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), the Department of Homeland
Security (DHS) and DoD services only able to communicate within their own
talkgroups, but not with the other Federal agencies, or with local or
state agencies.

Photo by Stephen Larsen

The ALMR is a true cooperative where the state of Alaska
provides the backbone infrastructure, such as microwave and radio sites,
and DoD provides the P25 radio network. Shown here is an ALMR repeater
site at Portage, Alaska.

"Now all local, state and Federal agencies in Alaska can
communicate with each other on the ALMR system," said Corzine.

"In fact, the FCC in a memorandum opinion and order when
giving us the waiver to use spectrum, cited the system as the first VHF
(very high frequency) system in the nation to be shared by federal, state
and local government agencies for public safety use," said Woodall, "not
only to be shared in emergencies, but to be shared for day-to-day
operations and allow seamless, smooth transition for emergency
support."

Woodall said that ALMR is compliant with Association of
Public Safety Communications Officials (APCO) Project 25 (P25), which
allows agencies in Alaska to use equipment from a variety of vendors, all
of which will operate interchangeably on the ALMR infrastructure.

"On ALMR, Motorola radios, E.F. Johnson radios, Thales
radios and M/A-COM P25 trunked subscriber unit radios can all operate on
our system," said Woodall. "It's not a specific, manufacturer-dependent
system, it's not proprietary approach. It's a standards-based, open-system
approach."

ALMR meets the highest-level of the Department of Homeland
Security's project SAFECOM goals, for communications interoperability
between federal, state and local agencies and complies with National
Incident Management System communication requirements within the National
Response Plan, as required by Homeland Security Presidential Directive
Five and Homeland Security Presidential Directive Eight.

"ALMR is to the far right of the SAFECOM continuum for
interoperability," said Woodall, which is based on five distinct areas.
First, is governance: "ALMR oversight is provided through an Executive
Council that also functions as the State's Interoperability Executive
Committee (SIEC)," said Woodall. Second, is Standard Operating Procedures
(SOPs): "ALMR uses standard incident command communications protocols and
SOPs for daily and emergency operations," said Woodall. Third, is
technology: "ALMR is a standards-based system approach," said Woodall.
Fourth, is training and exercises: "The ALMR cooperative user community is
involved in regional and statewide comprehensive training exercises, which
refine our operating processes and hone our ability to operate and
communicate as required," said Woodall. Fifth, is usage: "ALMR is a
single, shared network which is used daily by the federal, state and local
cooperative agencies engaged in the ALMR system," said Woodall.

First implementation pillar: fixed communications
infrastructure

Woodall said that a key to the ALMR planning process was
to establish what he called "four pillars of implementation." The first
ALMR implementation pillar is to provide fixed communications
infrastructure across the state.

"That fixed infrastructure makes up about 98 percent of
the system," said Woodall. "That's your fixed repeater sites along the
roadways, your standard three, five, ten channel system that provides the
coverage primarily outside of buildings."

"Right now we have 50 sites throughout the state - and
that's going to keep growing," said Casey Borg, a system technologist with
the ALMR program. Corzine added that when all ALMR sites are operational
it will include 97 sites, covering an area effectively equivalent to
reaching from the tip of Florida to Lake Michigan.

Second implementation pillar: coverage within
buildings and other critical infrastructure

The second ALMR implementation pillar is to provide
coverage within buildings and other critical infrastructure.

"You think 9-11 and you think of the firefighters going
into the building while the police are coming out," said Woodall. "So we
look at hospitals, we look at federal buildings - critical infrastructure
where we know that public safety personnel would need to go in - and (we
ask) not only can the communications from a high-powered repeater go into
that building, but can communications from a low-power portable unit come
out of that building?"

They can with bi-directional amplifiers, as the ALMR
program used to provide coverage within Ted Stevens International Airport
in Anchorage, and even through the three-mile Anton Anderson Memorial
Tunnel, through a mountain, to Whittier.

"A bi-directional amplifier is just that - it's
essentially two amplifier systems operating in opposite directions," said
Steve Schimack, an engineering consultant with the ALMR system, as he
demonstrated how the bi-directional amplifier worked at the Whittier
Tunnel. "Because of the length of this tunnel, up until now, it hasn't had
communications for police, fire and other government agencies. So by
installing this bi-directional amplifier system, it provides coverage to
agencies in an emergency situation or in other critical situations."

"This type of in-building coverage would have saved the
lives of a lot of firefighters, police officers and civilians at the World
Trade Center during 9-11," said Corzine.

Woodall added that they will be employing in-building
coverage solutions throughout the ALMR system in critical infrastructure
as required, and as determined by a system analysis and system design
process.

Photos by Stephen Larsen

The second ALMR implementation pillar is to provide
coverage within buildings and other critical infrastructure, such as they
did with a bi-directional amplifier system through the three-mile Anton
Anderson Memorial Tunnel, through a mountain, to Whittier. Left: A vehicle
emerges from the tunnel. Right: Jim Robinson (left) and Steve Schimack of
the ALMR program discuss the coverage inside the tunnel. "Because of the
length of this tunnel, up until now, it hasn't had communications for
police, fire and other government agencies," said Schimack. "So by
installing this by-directional amplifier system, it provides coverage to
agencies in an emergency situation or in other critical situations."

Third implementation pillar: gateway for disparate
radio systems

The third ALMR implementation pillar is to provide a
gateway to allow agencies with disparate radio systems to interoperate
within the ALMR infrastructure.

"We know that not everyone is going to come to the game
with standards-compliant radios that operate on the fixed infrastructure
that we have," said Woodall. "So we've put in place a gateway, so that
those with disparate radios can communicate with those people who are on
the ALMR system."

Woodall said ALMR uses a 'gateway-plus' approach.

"That is, public safety communications is
dispatch-centric," said Woodall. "So our gateway approach had to tie into
dispatch so that it would retain that dispatch centric approach."

Jody Cadieux, a training consultant with the ALMR program,
said the ALMR gateway enhances interoperability - "Especially on major
incidents," said Cadieux, "where you might have multiple agencies coming
in and those agencies are not all part of the ALMR system. It lets them be
able to communicate with each other without having to physically have an
ALMR handheld in their hand. They can still use their existing equipment
and be able to talk to people who are on the ALMR system."

"Not only does it do that," added Woodall, "but it allows
such things as aviation radios, air to ground, maritime radios, cellular
telephones, public switch telephone network - any other type of radio
system that you would want to get into the system to do so in a secure
manner. In fact, the FBI, who works a triple DES (Data Encryption
Standard) encryption with their radio system, can connect their system to
one side of the gateway and communicate with ALMR users with advanced
encryption standard on the other side of the gateway. The gateway will
allow us to communicate securely between each other without changing or
exchanging secure keys. In an emergency, that's extremely important."

Fourth implementation pillar: transportable
capability

The fourth ALMR implementation pillar is to provide a
transportable capability, to provide coverage in areas outside the range
of the fixed infrastructure to increase capacity during an emergency or
event, or to provide temporary communications for a site where
communications are down.

Photos by Stephen Larsen

The fourth ALMR implementation pillar is to provide a
transportable capability, to provide coverage in areas outside the range
of the fixed infrastructure to increase capacity during an emergency or
event, or to provide temporary communications for a site where
communications are down. Shown here is one of ALMR's four transportable
skids, the C and K-U band satellite skid that provides reachback, as well
as robust bandwidth to support National Incident Management System
implementation at remote sites. Left: The satellite skid is lowered from a
flatbed truck. Right: The erect satellite skid.

"Alaska's a huge state, one-fifth the size of the United
States," said Woodall. "We can't provide coverage everywhere. And if there
were a plane crash in the interior, or wildfires, which we have all the
time in the summer, agencies accumulate out there. And it's normally
outside of the coverage that you have."

"We have fires, we have emergencies and disasters that
sometimes take out all of the local forms of communications," added
William Laxson, an engineer with the ALMR program. "The river will flood,
and the central office in a village along the Yukon River will fall into
the river, which happened several years ago. Our transportable capability
can go in and provide emergency communications while they rebuild."

The transportable capability includes four skids. The
communications skid houses a five-channel, P25 trunk site and provides
connectivity to support voice, data, internet, telephone and video. The
dispatch skid provides for two dispatch locations along with control of
the gateway and foreign radio

equipment, acquisition and control of the satellite skid,
systems monitoring and mesh network control. The tower/generator skid
provides power and a crank-up microwave tower. The C and K-U band
satellite skid provides reachback, as well as robust bandwidth to support
National Incident Management System implementation at remote sites.

Each skid is MIL AIR transportable and complies with
requirements for both military and commercial sling lift operations, and
is ground-transportable on flatbeds, meeting standards and regulations for
transport along state and interstate highways.

"The flexibility in this transportable, of the links,
actually gives us the advantage of being able to deploy without knowing
what we've got to connect us to the world," said Harvey Wong, a systems
engineer with the ALMR program. "That's probably more important in an
emergency situation than in a normal situation where you get land line
connectivity out of your site."

ALMR tested during exercise Alaska Shield/Northern
Edge 2005

The ALMR system was run through its paces the week of Aug.
15, 2005 to Aug. 19, 2005 during exercise Alaska Shield/Northern Edge 2005
- the largest homeland security/homeland defense exercise in the state's
history. Federal, state and local agencies responded to simulated
emergencies, including an airplane crash and reports of terrorists, with
weapons of mass destruction coming into the Whittier area on a ferry
boat.

"We know that disaster can strike at any time, at any
moment, without warning, with enormous consequences," said Mark Begich,
the mayor of Anchorage at a press conference kicking off a disaster drill
at Kincaid Park on Aug. 18. "We believe it is our duty to be prepared and
be ready to respond."

"Anybody who has read the 9-11 Commission report, or who
has participated in a disaster, knows that communication is the biggest
challenge and something that always fails," said Heather Handyside, the
director of Homeland Security &Community Preparedness for Anchorage,
at the same press conference. She added that Anchorage officials had high
hopes that the ALMR system would allow first responders interoperable
communications during the drill.

Photo by Stephen Larsen

Heather Handyside, the director of Homeland Security
&Community Preparedness for Anchorage, speaks at a press conference on
Aug. 18 kicking off a disaster drill as part of exercise Alaska
Shield/Northern Edge 2005. "Anybody who has read the 9-11 Commission
report, or who has participated in a disaster, knows that communication is
the biggest challenge and something that always fails," said Handyside,
adding that she was confident that the ALMR system would allow first
responders interoperable communications. Mark Begich, the mayor of
Anchorage, looks on.

How well did ALMR do during exercise Alaska
Shield/Northern Edge 2005? Overall, officials agreed that the ALMR system
performed well, but there were lessons learned. For instance: No matter
how good the technology is, the human element is critically important.

A case in point: Woodall told how a National Guard unit
showed up at the exercise without knowing how to program or properly
communicate with their ALMR radios.

"The fifth element of the SAFECOM continuum is day-to-day
usage," noted Woodall. "Because the more you use it (your land mobile
radio system), the more you're familiar with it. Down at the user level,
the guy that holds the radio and communicates on it, if he's not
exercising with it, if he's not using it day-to-day, if he's not following
standard operating procedures and communications protocols, you're going
to have problems communicating."

"What we're learning here on the Alaska Shield/Northern
Edge exercise is that it (ALMR) works - and the technology will help us,"
said John Madden, the Assistant Federal Security Director, Anchorage with
the U.S. Dept. of Homeland Security/Transportation Security
Administration. "The big challenge now is to work on the 'people' part of
it - the plans, the policies, the procedures, the practices, so that they
can now be updated to match the technology."

What does the ALMR solution give the state of Alaska that
it didn't have before?

"From a DoD perspective, all of the military installations
across the state can communicate secure, on-demand, in real-time," said
Woodall. "We can interoperate with public safety agencies at the federal,
state and local levels. We can interoperate with Alaska state troopers or
local fire and police, which is something we could not do before - and
those agencies can now communicate seamlessly, securely, on-demand and in
real-time, something they could not do until ALMR was implemented."

"The most important thing is interoperability between our
jurisdiction and other jurisdiction agencies," said Handyside. "For
example, wildfires in our community are a huge concern, especially in the
state of Alaska where last year 6 million acres of forest and other land
burned. So a coordinated fire response to those wildfires is crucial, an
obstacle that we have to overcome again and again is communication between
the different resources that come to fight these fires in our state. And
we believe ALMR is the key to making that seamless communication available
to us."

Is ALMR a template for other states?

Can other states benefit from the Alaska Land Mobile Radio
solution - does it provide a template to other states for Homeland
Security/Homeland Defense communications?

"I think other states have situations where they loose
their common carrier connectivity through fire, flood or earthquake," said
Laxson, "and a self-contained system that can link by satellite to an area
that's not affected by the imminent emergency certainly has universal
applicability throughout the United States."

"Other states can take the template that we made, and the
system," said Woodall. "For instance, Hawaii is already looking at our
transportable system. FEMA Region 10 (serving not only Alaska, but also
Idaho, Oregon and Washington) is taking a particular interest in the
capability that we have."

"I think that the template that Alaska is developing for
interoperable communications could be used nation-wide," said Handyside.
"We have representatives from federal, state and local entities, all
working together to try to make this system work. I think we're going to
come up with a simple, basic plan that will be easily transferable to
other jurisdictions."

All on the program agreed that the key to making ALMR work
is a framework of partnership between federal, state and local agencies,
enabling them to plan together, and to develop schemes to share not only
spectrum, but also to share costs.

"The Department of Defense is providing infrastructure
into state-owned sites and local-owned sites," said Woodall. "So it's a
true cooperative where the state provides the backbone infrastructure,
like microwave and radio sites, and DoD puts in the P25 radio network. And
together, we share the cost of not only implementation, but also of
operation of the system."

"It can work in other places -" said Madden "- if they
have that framework of cooperation already there. Technology does not make
partners - technology aids partnerships that are already in place."

Top-level buy-in a must

Woodall said that the program's success would not have
been achieved without the leadership of the ALMR Executive Council,
including Bill Tandeske, Commissioner of the Alaska Department of Public
Safety representing the state of Alaska; Heather Handyside representing
the Alaska Municipal League; John Madden representing Federal non-DoD
agencies; and Col. Kristine Clifton of the Headquarters, U.S. Alaskan
Command representing Federal DoD agencies.

"Executive-level buy-in is absolutely critical," said
Woodall, "and having an executive council ensures that buy-in is retained.
Planning is the first issue. If you don't plan together to be
interoperable, you won't be. If you don't plan to use the technology
that's standards based, you won't be interoperable. And so to do that, you
need to form, preferably at the senior executive level, a group that
provides guidance and direction, top-down."

"One of the challenges has been to develop a technology
and a protocol and a funding mechanism that can be applied both to the
larger metropolitan areas and to the very small rural areas," said
Handyside. "Anchorage has a population of about 300,000, whereas some
rural villages have a population of about 500. So developing a system that
is equitable in both areas, and effective in both areas, has been a
challenge, but we've been able to do so. And that's why I have so much
confidence that in other communities and in other states this process will
be a little bit easier for them than it has been for us."

"There are so many different budgeting systems and cycles,
some are centralized, some are not centralized, some are put into
operations, some are in tactical accounts," said Madden. "So that balance
there - the biggest challenge we have is to synchronize all these systems
so we that can all contribute to the maintaining and improving of the
system."

APM LMR a key partner

Woodall said that a key partner in providing the ALMR
solution was the Assistant Project Manager, Land Mobile Radio (APM LMR),
out of Fort Monmouth, New Jersey. APM LMR, which is part of the Project
Manager, Defense Communications and Army Transmission Systems (PM DCATS)
and U.S. Army Program Executive Office, Enterprise Information Systems
(PEO EIS), manages a comprehensive base radio systems contract.

"The base radio support contract at Fort Monmouth that the
Army has put in place is a godsend for us," said Woodall. "It's a one-stop
shop for the types of things that we need when implementing our four
pillars - the fixed infrastructure, the in-building coverage, the gateway
approaches, the transportable approach. And even beyond that, we're able
to look into the security approach, the defense information system
accreditation and the certification processes. That contract vehicle and
the personnel that administered that contract vehicle in place to provide
a level of support that we've not seen in any other contract vehicle -
extremely valuable to a program manager. We would be lost without the
expertise and the professionalism and the capability that APM LMR and the
BRS contract brings to us."

The result is that Alaska is the first state in the U.S.
to have an interoperable Land Mobile Radio system for first-responder,
Homeland Security/Homeland Defense communications. All involved agree that
it was only possible because they built the system painstakingly on a
foundation of partnership, allowing federal, state and local agencies to
come together and overcame barriers of funding, spectrum and agency
differences. To make such a land mobile radio implementation work, the
players in the process must focus on what they have in common.

"We have a shared mission, and that's the safety and
security of the people," said Madden. "We have different backgrounds, but
we have the same foreground - the safety and security of the American
people is what drives us all."

Photo by Stephen Larsen

The ALMR system was run through its paces the week of Aug.
15, 2005 to Aug. 19, 2005 during exercise Alaska Shield/Northern Edge 2005
- the largest homeland security/homeland defense exercise in the state's
history. Here, as part of the exercise, a SWAT team of FBI personnel and
Alaska State Troopers approach a ferry boat, aboard which there was a
simulation of terrorists possibly arriving with weapons of mass
destruction.