Oct 27 1997 - 2 firemen die in house fire - see the NIOSH report below - no contact could be made with them via radio - they were using VHF highband back then - I think the fireground channel was 153.83 simplex
http://articles.philly.com/2006-08-09/news/25397560_1_digital-radios-motorola-lawsuits
http://www.cdc.gov/niosh/fire/reports/face200405.html - 1 firefighter dies in a fire - Jan 9, 2004 - no mention of radios
Philly also had the Meridien Plaza highrise fire - IIRC they lost 3 FF at that fire - I am not sure if the VHF radios played a role or not
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2 firefighters died in the basement of a home IIRC - or maybe it was a different LODD situation - but there was an incident were MAYDAYs were sent out, but they were encrypted - I need to review the 2005 auditors report below for more info - [July 28, 2011 - no mention of FD LODDs in the Auditor's report]
July 2010 - possibly the mayday signal itself was encrypted therefore it could not be decoded by the consoles - based on what I have dug up online recently - I need to document my finds with documents :- (not an easy task)