Marine Corps Marathon

The Marine Corps Marathon is this Sunday. This is one of Washington's biggest annual events. The race begins at 8 AM in Arlington, winds its way through the District, and concludes back in Arlington. Events don't wrap up until late in the afternoon. Here are some of the trunked systems to monitor:

• Primary operations for the Marathon will probably be on site 403 of the 14C Project 25 trunked system. Talkgroups are typically in the 63xxx range. For the past several years, most transmissions have been unencrypted. Only in one recent year (2007) were they almost entirely encrypted.
• Arlington County typically uses numerous talkgroups on its Project 25 trunked system. Look for several police, fire, emergency management, and coordination talkgroups to be active.
• DC also plays a large role in race operations, particularly with medical calls. Look for one or more of the DCFD Special Events talkgroups to be active on the District's trunked system. (MPD also uses talkgroups for traffic control - usually SOD and MPD 3 - but those are now encrypted.)
• Virginia State Police handles traffic control on I-395 and the 14th Street Bridge. Last year, they were on talkgroup 6149 on the Arlington site of STARS.
• The Metro system is obviously used very heavily on race day. Transit Police use one or more of the Tac channels for crowd control at various stations.

Here are conventional frequencies that were active last year:

• 123.0250 [ CSQ] Helicopters Air-to-Air
• 162.2500 [173.8] Capitol Police (Channel 4)
• 166.7250 [127.3] Park Police (Channel 1)
• 169.7750 [NAC 4C5] George Washington Parkway
• 451.7750 [ d205] Crystal City Security