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Air Force Jams Garage Doors
SonicSpike points us to a Chicago Tribune article reporting that in Colorado the Air Force is jamming garage doors. In a joint U.S.-Canadian operation, they were testing communications on a frequency that would be used by first responders in the event of a threat to homeland security. From the article: "But the frequency also controls an estimated 50 million garage door openers, and hundreds of residents in the area found that theirs had suddenly stopped working... Technically, the Air Force has the right to the frequency, which it began using nearly three years ago at some bases. Signals have previously interfered with garage doors near bases in Florida, Maryland, and Pennsylvania."
Nah, its not $10,000, just 250 for each garage door affected.
David McGuire, whose Overhead Door Co. received more than 400 calls for help, said the Air Force may be able to slightly adjust the transmission frequency to solve the problem. If not, it will cost homeowners about $250 to have new units installed.
Is it true that more people vote for the winner of American Idol, than vote for the president? -Ali G.
TFA was short on details. This article http://www.krdotv.com/story.cfm?nav=news&storyID=1 613 says disruptions were affecting devices in the 390 MHz spectrum range.
According to the US Department of Commerce, http://www.ntia.doc.gov/osmhome/allochrt.pdf, the 335.4 to 399.9 MHz band is licensed exclusively to the government.
Sorry for the lack of HTML skills.
Ah yes - the immediate assumption that the citizens are in the right, and the goverment in the wrong. Only in this case, that assumption is wrong.
Garage door openers are what are called class 'B' devices - devices that transmit using extremely low power and are unlicensed and unregulated. Because they are extremely low power, they can pretty much use any band they want. In exchange for this freedom from licensing and regulation however, theres a catch - owners of class 'B' devices may not interfere with legal and/or licensed users of the band in question, and must accept any interference from said legal and/or licensed users of the band in question. This is usually spelled out in tiny, tiny print in the users manual.
That being said - you'd be surprised how much class 'B' (sometimes called 'part 15') devices you have in your house. I bet if you check the manuals for your computer (or motherboard), your stereo, your TV, any radios, etc... I bet they all carry the appropriate disclaimers.
Nope. Garage door openers are Class B (or Part 15) devices - which mean they are extremely low power. The first responders would only be jammed if someone pointed a garage door opener right at them from less than 30-40 feet away.
Unless you lived in NYC or DC - I'm hardly surpised you didn't hear EPS broadcasts. The EPS is for local use - and thus would not have been activated unless the attacks were local to you.
This also happened in Ottawa in 2005. This story and this story sum up the incident. I was in Ottawa at the time, and I keenly remember the US Embassy lying to our face about using this signal. "Oddly" enough, the problem stopped once the CBC contacted the Embassy and asked them about it. Too bad those engineers didn't get to trace the signal back. What also got to me while trying to get through downtown is how the embassy is allowed to eat up a lane of traffic for their precious concrete walls, as if there was ever a real danger in Canada. I heard that those walls were tested in Canada because of the low risk, I guess it's convenient to test concrete walls and signal jamming here.
There is another kind of evil which we must fear most, and that is the indifference of good men. -- Boondock Saints
So the test was a total success. Because it proved, in undeniable public, that in the event of an emergency, the first responders around essential Air Force bases would be getting jammed by people opening their garage doors.
Yeah, a system operating out of Cheyenne mountain with an antenna on the peak and a range of miles is going to be affected by a bunch of milliwatt transmitters with an effective range of about 100 feet. Time for you to go back to Radio Theory 101.
These tests are important. That's why I was stunned when I realized (3 years later) that on September 11, 2001, I didn't hear a single transmission of the Emergency Broadcast System. If ever there were an emergency during my lifetime that the public needed broadcasts to know what what was happening and what to do, it was multiple aerial bombings of NYC and the Pentagon. But there was nothing.
Though we'd all been taught since childhood to be always at least a little bit subconsciously afraid, but trusting the government had a system to handle even the ultimate emergency: nuclear war. And endured countless nerve-rattling drills, usually interrupting the most otherwise "relaxing" TV and radio (PBS, mostly).
The Emergency Broadcast System was retired in 1994. The current system is teh Emergency Alert System. This name more accurately describes its purpose. It's not meant to be a news channel. On 9-11 we had plenty of those already. The purpose of the EBS is to inform people that they may need to take action, and take it quickly. Things like wildfires, flash floods, or tsunamis--- those are what you use the EBS for. Since the appropriate action in the aftermath of a plane hitting a building is to essentially stay calm, stay put, and let emergency crews do their job, the EBS was not needed. I've heard the EBS used for real locally. The message is usually terse, prerecorded, and informative only in a very limited way, briefly outlining the danger, its location, and what to do. You know, something along the lines of "Flash flood warning for the eastern county, stay out of the lower canyons area, highways A, B, and C are closed". This weird fantasy you have in your head where Walter Cronkite is supposed to come on the air over EBS and give us the low-down on what's up is laughable in the extreme.
I guess those weren't "tests" at all. They were the real thing: steady fear/trust propaganda.
Yeah, OK. I don't trust the government either, but I haven't let paranoia turn me into a freak about it. The EAS works fine. You just don't know what it's for. You've apparently formulated an expectation based not upon the stated purpose of the system, but upon armchair speculation after having the EAS/EBS tone interrupt your viewing of National Geographic Explorer a few too many times.
Never really expected to do anything in any kind of emergency, even survivable ones like 9/11/2001. Because they all delivered the desired result.
I'd still love to hear what you think the EAS should have broadcast on 9-11.
So maybe these Air Force tests are really failures. Because instead of keeping people irrationally afraid, yet trusting the government, they've actually woken people up.
Yeah.... sure. You know conspiracy nuts like you are all the same. You're all secretly (or not secretly!) obsessive/compulsive control freaks. You all believe there's some sort of sinister puppet master behind the scenes, twisting the government to their will. You can't bear to consider the real truth, that for the most part the bad things that happen are completely unpredictable and mostly unavoidable. Stupid things the government does or fails to do are not part of some grand plan by a criminal mastermind, but simply a byproduct of the sheer size of government. Its very size creates an incredible amount of inertia, and when it does manage to move, it's either too much or too little, and often in the wrong direction. In short nobody is in contr
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
According to this article, most door openers use 390 MHz, with some using 315 MHz and 372 MHz. All of these frequencies are in a band that is reserved for the federal government. For example, military aeronautical radio systems, including the backup communications system on the Space Shuttle, use the 225-400 MHz band. Any unlicensed users of this band do so at their own risk. The manufacturers of garage door openers have only themselves to blame. It's like building a house in that nice, empty artillery practice range.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
Unlicensed radio systems (like the garage door openers, ALL your WiFi gear, your car keyfob, etc etc, but NOT, IIRC, cell phones) operate under "FCC Part 15," widely mentioned elsewhere in this discussion. The important point in this regard is that ALL Part 15 devices operate subject to two inflexible rules: 1) you can't interfere with licensed users, and 2) it's your bad luck if licensed users interfere with you.
Unless a manufacturer of wireless gadgets wants to require every user to get a license (not an option for most gear), there is basically NO way to avoid the Part 15 restrictions; licensed users (emergency services, licensed commercial radio systems, and militery users) will always trump nonlicensed users. It won't happen often, but when it does, ya just gotta live with it.
"My strength is as the strength of ten men, for I am wired to the eyeballs on espresso."
I would suspect that making a device which intereferes with first responders (or any gov't) frequency would count as harmful interference and be illegal under most coutnries laws.
Who said they did?
"Interference" is not a reflexive relation. If you put a WAP next to six microwaves, you're going to have problems with your wi-fi network. But your WAP isn't going to overcook your food.
This story is about the USAF's use blocking garage door openers, not the other way around.
The questions is *when* did the US gov't acquire this frequency?
Another poster says 1934.
You can get a logic board for most newer Chamberlain openers that works on the 420MHz frequency. When I was working there, we had the ability to send one out for free at our discretion if a customer was having interference issues. I live near Davis Monthan AFB, and phantom door operation is a common thing if you live near the base when using the older 390MHz boards. (insurance claim anyone?)
I don't have any problems with my 420MHz board, in fact I get a better range with my remotes on 420MHz. If you are having problems with an opener made by Chamberlain (LiftMaster, Craftsman, etc) give them a call at (800) 528-5880 and explain the problems you are having and mention that you live near an Air Force Base, and they will likely send out a replacement board free of cost.
If you do have to pay, it is ~$60USD for a new logic board. They are very easy to replace.
"However, the spectrum is licensed by the FCC as part of the public airwaves." The FCC has no jurisdiction over government (eg military) radio/spectrum use. The National Telecommunications and Information Administration does. www.ntia.gov
And the NTIA trumps the FCC. The NTIA assigns frequency blocks to the FCC.
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