by AllThingsECC.com | Jan 18, 2019 | Articles, Comm Center News
By Brent Williams, Senior EMS Advisor
FirstNet is making its mark across the country and as I meet with emergency medical services professionals, I’m pleased to hear their feedback on the initial benefits of having their own dedicated network. With more than 5,250 public safety agencies currently subscribed to FirstNet, we are learning more each day from first responders about how the network is enhancing emergency communications.
As guest host of the FirstNet Authority’s Public Safety First podcast, I had the pleasure of talking with Dr. Paul Zeeb, Medical Director for the Metropolitan Emergency Communications Consortium in Central Ohio, and Plain Township (OH) Assistant Fire Chief Jack Rupp. Both underscored that during emergency response, the ability to share data quickly during critical and routine incidents is imperative to ensuring patients receive the best quality care available.
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by AllThingsECC.com | Jan 11, 2019 | Articles, Comm Center News
By TJ Kennedy, Co-Founder Public Safety Network
It’s been a tremendously exciting year for the development and implementation of new technologies leveraging public safety broadband capabilities. In the course of our travels this year, we have seen tremendous progress in the use of broadband capabilities for mission critical communications across the globe, including in Australia, Canada, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Japan, Korea, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, the United Kingdom (UK), and of course, the United States (US). We have seen increased issuance of RFI and RFPs, and greater focus than ever on deployment of new critical communications LTE networks.
The progress in the US has been nothing less than astounding. I could not be prouder of the implementation and operational network in place with the FirstNet.gov team and the AT&T/FirstNet team (FirstNet.com).
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by AllThingsECC.com | Jan 4, 2019 | Articles, Comm Center News
By Edward Parkinson, Acting CEO
The First Responder Network Authority team is deeply saddened to hear of the passing of former Board member Ed Reynolds on New Year’s Day. Ed was inducted into the Wireless Hall of Fame just a few months ago after an accomplished career in wireless technology spanning several decades.
Ed had the distinction of being a founding member of the FirstNet Board, serving during our startup days through the launch of the Network in early 2018. He was a dedicated and valuable member of the Board’s Technology and Finance committees during that time.
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by AllThingsECC.com | Dec 31, 2018 | Comm Center News
The disruption affected 911 emergency services nationwide. FCC Chairman Ajit Pai called the problem “particularly troubling” in its “breadth and duration.”
SOURCE: cnet.com
DATE: December 29, 2018
A nationwide outage for CenturyLink customers, including those trying to reach 911 emergency service, dragged on for the better part of two days before its resolution late Friday.
The outage hit customers of CenturyLink, a phone, internet and TV service provider, in areas including Idaho, New Mexico and Minnesota. The company’s site lists residential services in 35 states.
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by AllThingsECC.com | Dec 31, 2018 | Comm Center News
A widespread outage on CenturyLink’s cloud network that lasted almost two days and hampered emergency phone service in Washington and other states was caused by a faulty network management card, according to a customer notice.
SOURCE: GeekWire
DATE: December 29, 2018
Brian Krebs, a veteran security journalist, posted a copy of a notice sent to CenturyLink’s “core customers” to his Twitter feed Saturday that blamed a card at its data center in Colorado for “propagating invalid frame packets across devices,” causing a series of issues that forced the company to reboot much of its networking equipment. It took CenturyLink more than two days from when it first identified the issues to sound the all-clear on Saturday morning, a period during which 911 services in several states including Washington were down or spotty.
by AllThingsECC.com | Dec 28, 2018 | Comm Center News
DATE: The first year of Minnesota’s statewide Text-to-911 system is showing that the service is saving lives and making it easier to contact first responders.
SOURCE: Redwood Falls Gazette
DATE: December 27, 2018
The department of public safety emergency communication networks division (DPS-ECN) reports that dispatchers received more than 4,500 texts since the program’s deployment in December 2017, an average of 375 texts per month.
Text-to-911 provides a direct lifeline for the 20 percent of Minnesotans who have some form of hearing loss. DPS-ECN has worked closely with the Minnesota Commission of Deaf, Deaf-blind and Hard of Hearing Minnesotans to educate the public about the service.
