TOP STORY of the Day: Clearing up the rumors that police scanners are down

Those who listen to police radio for Clay County over the past few days have tuned in to silence.

THE RUMOR IS: During the recent inclement weather over the past few days, a lightning strike hit one of the two, if not both, during the storms: Knocking out the police radio for Clay County.

Generally, according to local officials, workarounds are set up to handle the situation.

"If 911 goes down, it rolls over to another county," said Chief Deputy Josh Clarke about the officers and dispatchers remaining in constant communication to serve the public. "With radio towers, they automatically switch to another tower if one goes down."

However, the public does not need to worry about the police radio scanner because the dispatch system is working. Dispatchers and officers communicate daily, 24-hours-a-day to be exact.

"It has not caused us any issues," said Clay County 911 Director Melissa Gambill. "We are operating as normal when it comes to day-to-day operations. We are alerted to any problems when a radio tower goes down, and it transfers to the closest one, and we keep working."

With the local police radio system online and working, the problem could stem from the person or company that provides the public scanner service to whatever format a listener might be using.

Clay County Emergency Management Director Rob Gambill has contacted IPSC (Indiana Public Safety Commission), ensuring highly trained public safety personnel are provided with the best equipment possible to perform their jobs, including radio towers.

"It's probably on the end of the person providing access to the public," said Gambill. "Everything at the repeater towers (800 megahertz) is working. There were no lightning strikes to any of our radio towers or the state's system. I do not believe that any of the 800Mhz towers we use were out of service due to the storm, nor were ours."

So, most officials agree that if any damage was done, it probably was to a tower that supplies the public access feed to online scanners and apps, which is not an issue with the local police scanner system. Those who have real police radios will be able to still listen to what is going on.