PACE Domain Summary
DRAFT ONLY
This Plan is currently only a DRAFT and has not been accepted or implemented by WICEN WA. It is largely incomplete.
Why this page exists
The Overview describes PACE as a single ladder: Primary, Alternate, Contingency, Emergency, each layer assumed to only be used once the layer above it has failed.
In practice, WICEN-WA’s communications cover several different jobs — alerting members, coordinating an incident, moving long-form traffic statewide, running a field team, liaising interstate — and each of those jobs has its own Primary/Alternate/Contingency/Emergency answer. Trying to describe all of them with one ladder is what caused MeshCore (and other local/tactical tools) to have nowhere to sit in the plan.
This page names those domains explicitly, so a reader can see the whole shape of the plan in one place instead of piecing it together from several pages. Each domain keeps its own detail page; this page is the map, not a replacement for them.
Domains
| Domain | Scope | Primary | Alternate | Contingency | Emergency |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Activation & Alerting | Getting members mobilised before/at the start of an incident | Internet Messaging (App/Signal/Discord) | Email Distribution | SMS Broadcast | Amateur Radio Alert Net (HF) |
| Strategic Coordination | Incident-level coordination and command, once activated | Internet Collaboration Platform | Amateur Radio Voice Nets | Amateur Radio Digital Messaging | Voice Relay Network |
| Long-Haul Message Traffic | Structured, state/regional-scale message traffic over HF | Winlink (HF) | JS8Call (HF) | Not yet defined | Not yet defined |
| Local/Tactical Field Comms | Team-level comms for a single field unit or task group | VHF/UHF Voice (simplex/repeater) | Local digital mesh/messaging (may end up as two separate systems — a non-ham community intake layer and a ham-to-ham operator layer — rather than one; technology not yet chosen, see Committee Discussion) | HF Voice (if the team is remote enough to need it) | Runner / face-to-face |
| Cross-State Coordination | Liaison with interstate amateur emergency comms groups | Internet Collaboration Platform | Winlink HF Email | HF Voice Liaison | Not yet defined |
Local/Tactical Field Comms doctrine (node roles, standing orders, use cases) is still being drafted and does not have its own page yet — see Deployment Model for where this domain sits organisationally in the meantime.
Cross-cutting — not a ladder: Situational Awareness (APRS position/message beacons, and adverts from whichever local mesh system is chosen) runs alongside whichever tier of whichever domain is currently active, rather than sitting in any one domain’s ladder.
Cross-cutting — voice procedure: every voice tier in every domain above — the HF alert net, voice nets, the voice relay network, field VHF/UHF and HF, and interstate HF liaison — uses the same Voice Procedure (RATEL). The ladders say which system to use; that page says how to talk on it.
Permanent infrastructure vs portable capability
The table above describes what each tier uses, not whether it’s already there or has to be brought in. Every technology named above can exist as either standing infrastructure, in place all the time regardless of activation, or portable kit, carried to wherever a deployment needs it — and those two forms have completely different cost and maintenance profiles.
WICEN WA isn’t starting from zero on standing infrastructure: South West WA’s existing APRS digipeater network and an expanding MeshCore coverage area are both already real, already providing baseline coverage, and neither needed WICEN to build them. A permanently sited AREDN network in major centres, by contrast, would be genuinely new capital investment. Portable capability is a separate question again — a field go-kit could carry any of these technologies regardless of what’s permanently sited nearby. See Committee Discussion §10 for the open questions this raises.
Cascade rule, and the one exception to it
Every domain above follows the Overview’s rule — each layer assumes the layer above it has failed — with one deliberate exception:
Local/Tactical Field Comms. The Alternate tier — whichever local digital mesh/messaging system is eventually chosen — is run in parallel with the Primary tier (VHF/UHF voice) as standard practice, not held in reserve. This is a deliberate exemption from the cascade rule, for training and validation reasons: a system that’s only ever switched on after voice has already failed is a system nobody has practised using under pressure. All other domains keep the strict cascade. This exemption is about when the Alternate tier runs, not which technology fills it — see Committee Discussion for that still-open question.
Net discipline
Because there are now several domains instead of one ladder, net controllers and operators must name which domain they mean, not just the tier. “Field Comms going to Alternate, mesh” is a complete instruction; “going to Alternate” on its own is not — it’s ambiguous between five different systems.
Methodology check: is each ladder actually redundant?
CISA’s guidance on PACE planning sets a Distinguishable test for any PACE ladder: two tiers are not genuinely redundant if they depend on the same underlying path, and “the same communications path or method should never be used more than once” as you step down a ladder — if one medium is degraded or denied, the next tier should use a different one entirely.
Run against the table above:
- Activation & Alerting — Primary (Internet Messaging) and Alternate (Email) both typically ride the same internet/cellular data path. If that path is down, both tiers fail together. This is a genuine gap, not just a documentation gap.
- Strategic Coordination — Primary (internet) to Alternate (radio) is a clean break. Contingency and Emergency are both amateur radio, but on different modes (digital vs. voice relay) — worth the committee confirming this counts as distinguishable enough, since RF conditions that degrade voice may also degrade digital.
- Long-Haul Message Traffic — Primary (Winlink) and Alternate (JS8Call) are both HF radio. They’re genuinely different digital modes with different failure characteristics (JS8Call tolerates far weaker signals), so this likely passes the test even though the underlying medium is shared — but it’s a closer call than a true medium change, and worth stating explicitly rather than assuming.
- Local/Tactical Field Comms — VHF/UHF, HF, and runner are three independent mediums regardless of which technology fills the Alternate tier; a local mesh/messaging system (LoRa, WiFi-based, or otherwise) adds a fourth. This domain passes cleanly under any of the candidate technologies discussed in Committee Discussion.
- Cross-State Coordination — same internet-to-radio break as Strategic Coordination; the undefined Emergency tier means the test can’t be completed yet.
CISA’s methodology also calls for explicit triggers — defined conditions for when to move from one tier to the next (e.g. what specifically counts as “voice has failed”). None of the domains on this site currently define these. That’s a gap across the whole plan, not specific to any one domain.
Open gaps
A few cells in the table above are marked Not yet defined — these are genuine gaps in the current draft, not omissions from this page:
- Long-Haul Message Traffic has no defined Contingency or Emergency tier.
- Cross-State Coordination has no defined Emergency tier.
- No domain defines explicit trigger conditions for moving between tiers (see Methodology check above).
- Activation & Alerting’s Primary/Alternate pair shares an underlying path and may not be truly redundant (see Methodology check above).
These need to be resolved as part of finishing the draft, not assumed.
Several of these gaps can’t actually be closed until the committee has settled the organisation’s aims and priorities — see Committee Discussion — Aims & Priorities.
References
This restructure draws on published methodology and comparable organisations’ plans, for context rather than as WICEN-WA policy:
- Leveraging the PACE Plan into the Emergency Communications Ecosystem — CISA/NCSWIC, 2023. Source of the Feasible/Acceptable/Suitable/Distinguishable/Complete test and the PACE-triggers concept used above. Also recommends a separate PACE plan per entity/scope rather than one universal ladder, which is the basis for this domain-based structure.
- WICEN (Vic.) Background Procedures & Techniques Manual — WICEN Victoria, 1994/2000. A sister WICEN organisation’s message-handling standard (serial numbers, precedence, date/time groups, prowords) — more detailed than this site’s current Message Handling page, useful if that page is expanded later.
- AIIMS 2025 — AFAC. The incident management doctrine every domain here ultimately has to fit into if WICEN WA is supporting a fire, emergency, or land management agency. See Deployment Model and Committee Discussion §2 for how little this plan currently references it.
- West Central Florida Section Emergency Communications Plan 2025 — ARRL ARES, West Central Florida Section. A comparable volunteer amateur emergency comms plan; notable for a four-level activation scale (Routine / Alert / Partial Activation / Full Activation) more granular than this site’s current three WICEN Status levels.