Originally scheduled for Melbourne FL the White House has made a last
minute change to the Presidents schedule that will bring Airforce One
into Daytona Beach on 10/16/04. Vice Presidential Candidate John
Edwards will be in Daytona Beach sometime on Sunday (probably early in
the day).

As with other Daytona Beach Presidential visits there will many radio
communications worth monitoring. For those interested in Secret Service
frequencies you can get them he
http://www.milaircomms.com/secret_service.html Most of what is on the
Secret Service will be encrypted as in the past. However from time to
time “red” comms slip through (red comms refers to non encrypted comms,
green comms refer to encrypted comms in the world of military and
government communications).

However as in the past the Daytona Beach “Special Events” trunk system
will be active. Freqs can be found he
http://www.milaircomms.com/police_fl_volusia.html You will want to
program the system marked “Daytona Beach”. The only active talk group
will be 14-xxx. This system only is \ used during special events. In
the past the Secret Service also made use of this system as a way to
communicate with Daytona Beach Police and Volusia Sheriff’s during the
motorcade and security details. All comms on this system are non-encrypted.

At this time I do not yet know when Airforce One will arrive however the
President will be speaking at 12:45PM. You can check the NOTAMS
(notices to airman) for a TFR (Temporary Flight Restriction) around the
Daytona Beach area. For a graphical map of all TFR’s you can go he
http://tfr.faa.gov/tfr/jsp/tfrmap.jsp Once a “red” box appears in the
Daytona Beach area simply click on it and you’ll then see the detail
description of the TFR which will give the effective times (all times
will be in UTC).

The most common question I get is “what frequency can I hear Airforce
One on?” The answer is the standard approach and tower freqs, nothing
special, Airforce One must use the same comms as any other plane in the
system. In fact Airforce One most likely will NOT use the UHF freqs but
as in the past visits use the standard VHF freqs. So program in the
approach and tower (120.7 MHz) freqs in your scanner and you’ll hear AF1.

In the event a CAP area is activated (Combat Air Patrol NOT Civil Air
Patrol) the most common frequencies used during CAP missions are found
he http://www.milaircomms.com/uhf_cap.html. 99% of all comms during
CAP missions are in the clear (265.400 MHz will probably be the active one).

If you want to see just how close you can get to AF1 and the motorcade
here’s some pictures of the Presidents visit in 2001:
http://www.milaircomms.com/secret_service.html

Have fun & Happy Listening,
George – KI4FIA – Daytona Beach
http://www.MilAirComms.com