Essex members support East Suffolk RAYNET

13th August 2026 Neil Smith

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Members of Essex RAYNET have been supporting East Suffolk RAYNET at the scene of the devastating heath fire in Dunwich, Suffolk, with assistance in maintaining the temporary onsite repeater with solar and battery power .

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As one of the firefighters involved in this incident, we must say a massive ‘Thank You’ to all the Raynet guys who came and assisted.

With all of the 18 fire services that sent fire appliances, as well as all the local trucks, ambulance & police unit’s that attended, the Tetra Airwaves system became overwhelmed (it’s the first time in 20 years of using Airwaves that I’ve seen ‘No Service’ pop up on the screen). Also, due to that fact that this incident was spread over such a wide area, the UHF simplex handhelds were out of range of each other, plus some services were using analogue, while other were on digital (DMR) on the same frequencies! (Causing further issues)

East Suffolk Raynet arrived with repeater, mast and multiple handhelds to issues to each team, restoring vital communication across the site. Thanks again guys!

Well done guys! We used to have an active Raynet here in the IOM but it kind of died a death many years ago. I left over a personal disagreement with the Controller but I think it was that most of what we did (motorsport support) was taken over by marshalls using government supplied TETRA radios.