Hey, folks, I'm forwarding this information from another list because the fire service has a vested interest in this action. Motorola has reportedly filed with the FCC for changes in regulations concerning in-building repeater systems. This is critical now more than ever since the 2009 International Fire Code finally addresses the issue of interior radio coverage.

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If you haven't heard, Motorola has filed comments to the FCC that would make most signal boosters illegal if accepted by the Commission.

This filing came as comments to FCC DA 10-4,  a proceeding looking into the current signal booster rules.

The FCC has defined two types of signal boosters under part 90.219 rules ;
- Class A which is 'channelized ' to only pass the discrete channels authorized to the licensee, typically 25, 12.5 0r 6.25 KHz wide
- Class B which is a 'broadband' signal booster that passes a block of channels that includes the licensee as well as others within the signal boosters passband.

Class B signal boosters almost exclusively dominate public safety in-building applications because of costs, size and power consumption
Motorola has requested the Class B signal booster classification be eliminated which would make more expensive Class A the only legal type.

Further, Motorola has requested the ERP of signal boosters be raised from 5 to 35 watts per channel. 
Most current public safety in-building installations radiate less than 1 watt ERP per channel.

Existing FCC Rules permit higher ERPs on a site license basis as any other station but Motorola seeks to have uncoordinated use.

I respectively request you, as a public safety agency, to take action if you want to continue to have multiple sources of competitive products.

You can get Motorola's comments, mine and many others by going to the FCC's  ECFS site and entering "10-4" as the proceeding.

      http://fjallfoss.fcc.gov/ecfs/comment_search/input?z=92q0y

The deadline for reply comments is March 8, but this will probably become NPRM soon. Regardless of your position, I advise every public safety agency agency to get involved while you can have a voice.

For additional information see http://www.npstc.org/documents/20071212_IBWG%20White%20Paper%20Appendix%20A-E.pdf

Thanks for your attention
Jack Daniel

The FCC is less than three weeks away from issuing thier long-awaited National Broadband Plan. Of interest to the fire service are issues concerning emergency communications and notifications uses for this technology, as well as its implications for Next Generation 9-1-1. When the report is released, I'll be back to post a link. In the meantime, you can keep up with the latest at www.broadband.gov.

PASADENA, Texas -- The lengthy reporting delay and confusion that prompted local officials to demand further investigation into a Pasadena plant’s chemical leak are evident in 911 tapes obtained by 11 News.

The toxic nitric oxide leak happened Tuesday night at the Air Products chemical facility along Highway 225.

After the leak was contained, Plant Manager Jacques Joseph told 11 News that there was no danger.
"We immediately alerted the local L.E.P.C. (Local Emergency Planning Committee),” he said. "We wanted to make sure that we take the necessary precautions to prevent injuries from happening to our local citizens.”
 
However, taped phone calls between the Pasadena Fire Department and the company reveal confusion and lengthy indecision.
 
After receiving reports from Pasadena police officers about the orange cloud drifting south over Highway 225, a fire department dispatcher calls the plant and can only get a voice mail message.
 
Next she calls the L.E.P.C. CAER (Community Awareness Emergency Response) Line, the service refineries and petrochemical plants are supposed to report to if they have a problem worthy of alerting the public.
 
“Have y’all gotten reports of this,” the dispatcher asks.
 
“No,” the CAER representative responds. “I haven't heard anything about it."
 
Next the operator reaches the Air Products and Chemicals Inc. facility in LaPorte.
 
"Yes this is Cassie with the Pasadena Fire Department.  Are y’all having some sort of leak?”
 
“No,” the company representative responds.
 
"An 18-wheeler trucker driver just drove through it and is now having respiratory problems,” the dispatcher tells her.
 
"I will get a hold of the plant, and could I get your name and number please,” the Air Products representative says.
 
Next the operator calls TxDOT asking them to look at their traffic cameras to see where the cloud is going. It is still drifting south across the Pasadena Freeway.
 
Then finally, Joseph, the plant manager calls her.
 
"Yes, there is a red to brown color of smoke with black inside,” the dispatcher tells him.
 
"Right,” is all he says in response.
 
"And I've been told by our PD patrol units,” says the dispatcher, “that it is coming from your facility there at 225 and Beltway 8."
 
"Right,” he responds again.
 
"Are y’all having any kind of spills,” the dispatcher asks.
 
“We were having problems and we put a lot in the CAER Line and you should have got a call from us indicating we were having problems,” Joseph says.
 
“Yeah I didn’t receive any calls,” the dispatcher says. "It's been about 20 minutes trying to figure out everything, so I needed to know why I didn't get a call.”
 
“Yeah it's happening right now and we're just trying to get it under control,” says Joseph.
 
In a separate call the dispatcher then has a conversation with another employee at the Air Products facility.
 
“It's probably a level one,” he tells the dispatcher, referring to the scale that rates the danger of the situation. “It's a visible plume and it’s easing outside the boundaries of our plant.”
 
The dispatcher tells the man what he’s just said doesn’t make sense.
 
“The cloud is leaving y’all’s facility? This is not a level one,” she says.
 
The man on the other end of the line then admits it is at least a level two event.
 
"OK is it hazardous to your health,” the female dispatcher asks the Air Products employee.
 
“Uh … yes, if you inhale it, yes ma'am,” he responds.
 
"So we need to have a shelter in place,” she says.
 
"Yes ma'am,” he responds.
 
"So that is not a level one or two, that's a three,” says the dispatcher.
 
The final conversation recorded by the Pasadena Fire Department is another call from the plant manager, Joseph, who says his company alerted authorities and the public immediately. He is talking to the same Pasadena Fire dispatcher.
 
“We kind of (got) it under control, but because of the wind direction and the low levels for the way it is, I would make sure we put some caution out there for folks that are traveling in the area that they kind of shelter in place,” said Joseph.
 
“OK, so there is going to be a shelter in place,” she asks him.
 
"Well I am trying to see…” says Joseph.
 
The dispatcher is adamant that she receives a better answer.
 
 "No, I need a ‘yes’ or a ‘no’ right now. Is there going to be a shelter in place? I have been dealing with this for about forty minutes,” she implores him.
 
“Yeah,” responds Joseph.
 
"And I am looking up in our books that it is saying that this could have respiration problems and possible death, so that is not OK,” the dispatcher says, telling him of the fire department’s research on nitric oxide. “And the fact that y'all reported this so late…”
 
"Well, go ahead,” says Joseph.
 
“So is it ‘yes’ or ‘no’ (that) I need to shelter in place on 225,” the dispatcher says pressing for an answer.
 
Joseph finally responds:  "Yeah."
 
11 News did not receive an immediate response from Air Products regarding the release of the 911 tapes and the 40 minute delay described by authorities.
 
The chemical release and the delay are under investigation by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality and the EPA.

911 dispatcher at center of Erie County investigation fired Mishandled call led to dismissal By KEVIN FLOWERS
kevin.flowers@timesnews.com

An emergency call that went awry -- and led to a dispatcher's firing Friday -- could become a training tool for telecommunicators at Erie County government's 911 center.
 
Erie County Public Safety Director Harry Love said the county is considering using a recording of the call "to point out what can happen when a call is not processed as it should be."

Love made his remarks in the wake of Friday's firing of Andrew Pennock, 22, a part-time telecommunicator at the county's 911 center in Summit Township telecommunicators are trained to answer and dispatch emergency calls.

"We might use it in our training. We are permitted by state law to do that," Love said. "We can show ... how a call-taker can lose control of a call."

Pennock's firing followed a two-day county investigation of his handling of a 911 call reporting that Willie McAdory, 67, was unresponsive and had passed out while visiting his son Jomo McAdory's southwest Erie home. Pennock, who earned about $12 an hour, did not return a telephone message seeking comment.

An EmergyCare operator was also involved in handling a portion of the call, after the determination was made that an ambulance was needed, Love said.

EmergyCare Executive Director Bill Hagerty said Friday that his company is conducting its own probe regarding how its employee handled the call.

Jomo McAdory said the county 911 operator was told that his father, Willie McAdory, needed medical help. McAdory told the Erie Times-News that he suspected his father was having heart trouble.

But Jomo McAdory said the dispatchers were rude and argued with him and his sister, Cassandra McAdory, on the telephone. Jomo McAdory also said several police cars were sent to his home, before an ambulance, because a dispatcher accused him of making threats.

An EmergyCare ambulance arrived at Jomo McAdory's home in the 900 block of West 32nd Street at 9:13 p.m. Tuesday, more than 10 minutes after the call was reported at 9:02 p.m. Police arrived at the home first.

Willie McAdory was later released after treatment at Hamot Medical Center.

Love and John Grappy, the county's 911 coordinator, recommended that Pennock be terminated after concluding their probe, which included review of a 911 recording of the emergency call and a meeting with the McAdory family on Friday morning.

Erie County Executive Barry Grossman agreed with the recommendation and also listened to the recording, along with the McAdory family, at his office on Friday.

"He didn't follow the protocol," Grossman said of Pennock. "Termination is the proper path here."

Grossman said he would have no problem with the 911 recording being used to train other telecommunicators, "to show them that this is not what to do during a 911 call."

Willie McAdory said Grossman, Love, Grappy and other county officials "were apologetic'' about the incident during their meeting at the Erie County Courthouse. "They said, 'We messed up.' What else could they say?" Willie McAdory said.

Love said the 911 call became heated on both ends. But Love said a telecommunicator is trained to stay cool and get the information needed to assist in an emergency, and that did not happen.

"You could say that the caller was agitated," Love said. "But when people call 911, they generally are upset. They're either angry, or they're scared to death.

"We're the ones trained to take charge of that call and determine the help needed," Love said. "When we deviate from that training, that's when problems arise."

 

Pittsburgh officials are reevaluating 911 dispatch protocols after Curtis Mitchell, 50, of Pittsburgh, died early Sunday morning.

Mitchell's fiancee, Sharon Edge, 51, said she called 911 continually for two days when he complained of abdominal pains. But despite three dispatch attempts, ambulances failed to reach Mitchell and Edge's snowed-in home.

"I was calling every half hour to say we need an ambulance now, and they never came," Edge told ABC News. "They said an ambulance was on the way but they came to the bridge, not our house. They asked us to walk to the bridge but he couldn't walk."

Edge was particularly concerned for Mitchell because they had no lights or gas due to the storm. They were cold and scared.

"Saturday night was the last time he was alive," she said. "He tried to get out of bed to come to the living room, and I covered him with a blanket because we had no heat. He had shortness of breath and could hardly breathe. They said they would come as soon as they can but he couldn't walk."

Edge was particularly concerned for Mitchell because they had no lights or gas due to the storm. They were cold and scared.

"Saturday night was the last time he was alive," she said. "He tried to get out of bed to come to the living room, and I covered him with a blanket because we had no heat. He had shortness of breath and could hardly breathe. They said they would come as soon as they can but he couldn't walk."

 
Communication Breakdown
Joanna Doven, press secretary for Pittsburgh Mayor Luke Ravenstahl's office, confirmed that 911 operators asked Mitchell and Edge to walk to a nearby bridge, noting that in the extreme circumstances of the two-foot snow, walking to meet an ambulance expedites rescue attempts.

Dover also confirmed that paramedics said if Mitchell wanted a ride to the hospital, he needed to walk out and meet the vehicle.

After review, The Department of Public safety in a report responding to the incident has since called that comment by paramedics "inappropriate." They said the main factor contributing to Mitchell's death was a serious communication breakdown.

On several occasions over the two days, Mitchell and Edge called paramedics only to give up on wait times and cancel requests, opting to stay home, medicate and attempt for Mitchell to sleep off the pain.
After cancellations, the 911 system treated each new call as a new incident. Had dispatchers and doctors known Mitchell's history, they would have treated new calls with a higher urgency level.

"Each call was seen as an individual request for assistance," the Department of Public Safety's report read. "Knowledge gained on previous calls was not communicated at the time of the next request.

"The current system ... works well when the system is not overwhelmed. However, during the first day of the winter emergency, the system required rapid processing of a large number of calls and formal paper documentation was for the most part abandoned."

'We Failed This Guy' The Department of Public Safety report laid out recommendations to amend the process, including improving recording methods, reevaluating how calls are cancelled, planning for future responses during major events and utilizing alternative vehicles such as fire trucks.

Still, "the response was unacceptable and inadequate," Doven told ABC News, "We failed this guy, we know we did, and we are taking steps to make sure this doesn't happen again. The public will see changes.

 


"We are changing the dispatching method right now. If there were a snowstorm tonight, people would not be waiting," Doven said. "On Saturday, our resources were severely strained. Unfortunately, somebody died and we should have gotten them. They shouldn't have died.

"We have the resources to get to this man the first time he called and we didn't get there," Doven added. "We need to be more reliable and more self-reliant. You either put on your boots and shovel your way there or you call fire."

Director of Public Safety Michael Huss echoed Doven's sentiments in a news conference Tuesday.

"You get out of the damn truck and you walk to the residence," Huss said.
Left in the Cold As for Edge, "One of the chiefs of the ambulance called to apologize," she said.

"Paramedics should have walked," she added. "But now I am the one left in the cold. I don't have my boyfriend. The mayor can't bring him back. I want the drivers of the ambulance to be responsible for what they did."

Edge now awaits an autopsy report. As more information about Mitchell's condition has been reported, including previous hospital stays and medication history, it seems possible that Mitchell's symptoms may have been pancreatic.

All Edge knows is that Mitchell died in pain.

"I fell asleep and then tried to wake him up but I couldn't wake him up," she said. "He was cold and I couldn't move him. Last thing he told me was that he loved me -- that he was sick and dying and couldn't take the pain no more."

Plans to Sue Once Mitchell is cremated and a memorial service has been held, Edge would like to take legal action against the city.

 




"He was a good person, a very nice person, would help anyone in need. Everyone loved him. I don't want this to happen to nobody else."

Safety officials have spoken to Edge and have sent their deepest condolences, Doven said.
"We are here to assist in anything she may need," she added.



 

An emergency dispatcher trainee saved his own choking baby during an emergency call on February 4th, according to a news release from the Thurston County Department of Communications (CAPCOM).

The center said a 9-1-1 call came in at 1:57 p.m. from a distraught mother who reported that her baby was choking. The call was answered by a trainee, Chris Scott, who is a Marine reservist who was back from a one-year deployment to Iraq. The center said Scott is in his final stages of training and was being monitored by his training supervisor, Tammy Clark.

Clark relayed the following story with the communications department:

“I want to tell you about the call my trainee took today. Chris is a Marine reservist who just got back after a deployment to Iraq. He is in his final stages of training and while taking calls today he took a choking baby call. Chris calmly confirmed the hysterical woman's address and gets help started in her direction. He stays calm throughout the call while going to the appropriate choking tab and starts to give pre-arrival instructions. After one full set of back blows the baby's airway is cleared and the infant starts to cry. Chris stays on the line and ensures the baby’s breathing normally until the fire department arrives. After he gets off the phone I get up to tell him what a great job he did and that he saved the child's life. Chris looks a little shaken and says "that was my baby". During the call I am completely unaware that the caller is his wife and the baby that is not breathing is Chris's own son, Jakob. At that point we realize what had transpired and send him home to be with his wife and son. The baby was treated and released by the local fire department. Chris stopped by later with his wife and son in tow. What an amazing and wonderful call... Semper Fi!”

A young MacGyver with a larcenous streak is sitting in a Suffolk County jail as investigators probe the theft of dozens of ambulance and firetruck radios on Long Island.

Steven Riddle - an 18-year-old with a gift for rewiring gadgets and a serious radio fetish, according to locals - is charged in three of those cases, police said.

But he is suspected in some of at least 28 similar ones reported in the last year by volunteer Nassau and Suffolk first-responders.

The startling spree even raised Homeland Security alerts, sources said.

Cops found a "mountain" of two-way and portable radios in his Bohemia, LI, home, a source said.

The former Explorer cadet with the Bohemia volunteer fire department is known for constantly fiddling with radio settings, firehouse sirens and anything else he could get his hands on, sources said.

Arrested on Jan. 8, Riddle is being held in Riverhead County Jail in lieu of $45,000 cash bail, said a Suffolk DA spokesman.

He's charged with stealing two radios from a Sayville Community ambulance on Dec. 27, two portable radios from a West Sayville fire chief's vehicle between Dec. 24 and 26, and two portable radios from an East Moriches fire vehicle on New Year's Day.

That same day, he allegedly broke a window in a Crown Victoria owned by the volunteer fire department, earning himself a criminal-mischief charge.

 

Ever wonder what it's like to work in a 9-1-1 Center? Chances are a good portion of the calls you have to answer come under the WTF rule. Unfortunately, they still have to be answered, because you can't tell by the way the phone rings whether it's a serious problem or not.

The local NBC affiliate paid our facility a visit and worked with us on this story. We estimate that about 10% of our call volume is non-essential, and that doesn't count "good intent" calls.

See the video and hear some gems at: http://wake.mync.com/site/Wake/news/story/47320/non-emergency-calls-clog-911-lines/

Four Mississippi college students died in their second-floor room at a motel after they dialed 911 to report the front of their room was being swept by flames. The women were visiting the Birmingham suburb of Hoover Dec. 20th when the fire broke out at about 8 p.m., caused from a live-in motel maintenance worker's unattended incense. High winds swept the flames on the lower level up to the second level of the 1960-era wooden motel, intensified by the motel's location on a hill. One of the women dialed 911 to say their room's front door was blocked by a wall of flames, and officials say the dispatcher told them to go into the bathroom and stay low. Arriving firefighters found the only hydrant was several hundred feet from the motel, and couldn't reach the women because the fire had been pushed upward by the wind, and across the face of the motel, including the second floor balcony where the women's room was located. About 25 rooms were destroyed or damaged at the unsprinklered motel, but the few other motel occupants escaped uninjured. Investigators found the women's bodies in the window-less bathroom. Investigators say the maintenance left the incense burning in his ground-level room, returned to find the room on fire and attempted to fight it. Two phones didn't work when he then tried to notify the front desk of the fire. He used two fire extinguishers, which didn't put out the fire in his room. Neighbors, passersby and other occupants then dialed 911 to report the fire.

Newark airport system down during crash land

 
By MURRAY WEISS, PHILIP MESSING and TOM TOPOUSIS
Last Updated: 10:13 PM, January 12, 2010
Posted: 3:06 AM, January 12, 2010
 
A crippled airliner landed safely at Newark Airport thanks to a veteran pilot's skill -- but the radio system used by the ground rescue team crashed just when it was needed most, The Post has learned. United Airlines Flight 634, its right landing gear malfunctioning, was approaching Newark on Sunday morning when rescue crews were alerted to race to the runway and prepare for a crash landing.
But by the time the teams were in place, their radios went dead, apparently because of utility work nearby. "There couldn't have been a worse time for it to go down," a source said of the foul-up involving the Port Authority's Air Fire Rescue frequency.
 
MAKING AIR WAVES: The radio system used by Newark Airport rescue crews conked out Sunday during the United airliner scare.
At 8:50 a.m., the emergency system alerted rescue teams to the possibly crippled airliner approaching Newark. But soon after, a sergeant on the ground realized he couldn't communicate with his desk or other squads.

Using cellphones, cops alerted the crews to switch to backup frequencies. But by the time that happened, sources said, the Airbus had already safely skidded to its landing, with the 48 passengers and crew members on board scampering from the craft on emergency slides. A PA spokesman confirmed that the first-responder frequency went down, but insisted crews were always able to communicate.
"The sergeant realized what was happening, and he told people they needed to switch frequencies to communicate with each other," the spokesman said.
Sources said the radio failure was only one of a spate of police communications failures. Airport patrol officers lost their radio contact at the same time the rescue frequencies went out, the sources insisted yesterday.
In addition, all parties had lost radio contact only hours before, from around midnight to 2 a.m., the sources said. Cops were alerted by cellphone to switch to backup systems. The problems began late Saturday, after utility crews were called to fix a major power surge at a PA facility in Hoboken, sources said.
Even Kennedy Airport was affected, losing the same communications capability between 10 p.m. Sunday to 2 a.m. yesterday. The pilot at the controls of the United flight was Capt. Dale Nordhausen, 41. "I'm really happy everyone was OK," he told The Post when reached at his Illinois home yesterday.
 
 

This morning's edition of the Today Show on NBC contained a feature that highlighted - or perhaps lowlighted - the current state of 9-1-1 in the United States. This was an incredibly accurate piece and should be of interest - and concern to every firefighter and fire officer. While showcasing a medical call in Texas where an agency did not provide pre-arrival instructions (a toddler died) the show went on to point out that many states have no standards for 9-1-1 telecommunicators, that some are paid less than fast food employees, and that "raids" on 9-1-1 funds whereby moneys are diverted to other uses are common. In these economic times, some 9-1-1 centers have also faced the "furlough" of employees or freezing of vacancies. The lack of adequate staffing anywhere in the response and suppression chain is dangerous.

I would urge each and every Secret List reader to watch the video at: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/34745516 to get a better understanding of the challenges and frustrations faced by the folks "on the other end of the radio."  Because, in the long run, your lives do depend on it.

Three Killed in N.Y. House Fire Outdated 911 system led to 15-minute delay. BY GENE WARNER

The Buffalo News, N.Y.


 A woman screaming for help as fire ripped through her Cheektowaga home early Wednesday morning called 911 on her cell phone, but an outdated local 911 system led to a 15-minute gap before police responded to the fire that killed three people.

Found in their Hyland Road home, near Buffalo Niagara International Airport, were fire victims Mohammad Ansari, 60; Faaiza Ansari, 25; and Saaiba Ansari, 22.

Authorities believe that Mohammad was the father of the two young women. Faaiza Ansari was a University at Buffalo medical student, while her sister was a UB undergraduate majoring in mechanical engineering.

All three were pronounced dead at the scene, a one-story home at 305 Hyland, located to the rear of 303 Hyland.

Police officials say they have found no sign of any human error in the delayed response to the first phone call.

The original call, made to 911 at 2:56 a.m., was routed to Buffalo, then Depew and finally to Cheektowaga because of the way that cell phone calls are handled, police said. The first patrol car reached the scene at 3:13 a.m.

"Ideally, we like to have a response time of a whole lot shorter than 15 minutes," Cheektowaga Police Capt. John A. Glascott said. "Due to the circumstances created by the system, it took us about 15 minutes to get a police car to a very dangerous situation."

Here was the sequence of events, according to Cheektowaga police:

-- The call for help was made at 2:56 a.m., but because it was from a cell phone, it was routed to Buffalo. And the screaming woman did not stay on the line long. "They lost contact with the cell phone, but the information they had was that the woman was screaming, from either 303 or 305 Hyland," Glascott said.

-- Authorities quickly determined that the cell phone signal was relayed through a tower located in Depew, so Depew police were called at 3:02 a.m. Part of Hyland is located in Depew.

-- Depew dispatchers determined that the address was in Cheektowaga, so they called Cheektowaga police at 3:04 a.m.

-- The card was "punched" into the Cheektowaga computer system at 3:07 a.m. The call, to check the condition of a screaming woman, then was dispatched to patrol cars at 3:09 a.m. Four minutes later, the first car arrived at the scene.

While authorities emphasized that the different agencies' clocks may not be synchronized, they acknowledged that at least 15 minutes elapsed between the call from the screaming woman and the first police car arriving at the scene.

Cheektowaga police officers went to the front house, at 303cq Hyland, and found no woman screaming and no apparent trouble before they proceeded to the rear house, where they smelled smoke and found the fire.

No one knows whether a quicker response time could have saved any of the three lives. "We have no way of knowing how long they were deceased when we got there," Cheektowaga Police Capt. James J. Speyer said. "Obviously, in a situation like this, time is of the essence, and every minute in our favor helps us. We wish that we would have gotten there sooner.

"We're very upset that a tragedy like this occurred, and we take it personally."

Glascott pointed out that no one involved in fielding and rerouting the original call knew the nature of the 911 caller's emergency.

"We've got one report of someone screaming into a cell phone," he said. "We have no idea that we have a working fire. We have no idea that we have a life-threatening situation. I do not see a single human error in this situation."

Glascott, who ran for Erie County sheriff this year, then talked about the larger problem. "What I'm seeing is an old 911 system that has not caught up with 2009 technology, and that led to a delay in our providing emergency services," he said. "We've talked about needing to improve the 911 system for quite some time. We need to do a better job of routing calls to proper agencies from cell phones. Many people do not have land-line phones in their home."

Once they arrived at the scene, Cheektowaga police carried the man out of the one-story house, located between George Urban Boulevard and the airport.

"When I got there, the police were already pulling the gentleman from the side door, and there was a lot of smoke coming from the eaves," Hy-View Fire Chief Jeffrey R. Glinski said. "We didn't see any fire at first."

Firefighters led by the Hy-View company broke the windows to gain entry and then noticed fire coming from the bedroom windows. Knowing that there may have been three people trapped inside, firefighters began looking for other victims and found the two women.

"They were found in a back bedroom lying on the floor," Glinski said. "From what I was told, there was no hope for them."

Outside the home, Rural/Metro Medical Services emergency personnel worked on Mohammad Ansari, but he also was pronounced dead at the scene.

More than 50 volunteer firefighters from Hy-View, U-Crest, Forks and Depew spent between an hour and an hour and a half bringing the fire under control. The fire gutted the home, but no damage estimate or cause was available late Wednesday.

"At this point, it does not appear that it was a suspicious fire," Speyer said at the scene, in a comment he repeated Wednesday afternoon.

Emergency workers at the scene not only braved early morning temperatures in the high teens, but they also had to cope with the deaths of three people just two days before Christmas.

"It's definitely not easy, especially this time of the year," Glinski said. "Families are so important."

McClatchy-Tribune News Service

A woman arrested last Friday for making 48 phony 911 calls to county police dispatchers was a volunteer firefighter, according to court records released Monday.

Caryn Sodaro, 44, lives in Lochbuie, but was a volunteer firefighter in Hudson. She told investigators that after she made the phony suicide and ambulance calls, she listened to the law enforcement reactions on her department-issued police radio.

Most of the phony calls in the past few months were threats of suicide, and Sodaro told investigators that she is “depressed and thinks of suicide,” according to court affidavits.

Deputy Terie Rinne documented the 48 calls that Sodaro is accused of making, including:

• The first call on Aug. 4, a woman said she had suicidal thoughts and she was calling from the Carbon Valley Recreation Center in Frederick. Although they were able to track the telephone to a Frederick address, she used a prepaid cell phone, which made it almost impossible to locate the owner.

• Sept. 6: a woman called to say she was calling to tell the police where to find her body. She said she was between Lochbuie and Hudson and was going to step in front of the first train to come by.

• Oct. 10: A woman called dispatch to say she was at a gas station in Lochbuie and she needed an ambulance. She was not located.

• Oct. 17 : A woman called dispatch to report that her mother was not breathing and they were driving on Colo. 52 near Hudson. She said her name was Abby.

• Nov. 3: A female caller said she was in a church parking lot in Firestone “to blow her head off, and if she can't do it before the police get there, she is going to make them do it for her.” She was never located.

After many of the calls, the phone number suddenly changed, and sheriff's deputies, Fort Lupton and Lochbuie police found that the new telephone had been purchased at a store in Brighton. From that store, they traced the cell phone to Sodaro.

They found the cell phone that was used in some of the calls in her bedroom.

Court records also stated, Sodaro said “she utilized the (radio) packset she got from the Hudson Fire Department to monitor the law enforcement responses she got to her calls.”

 

New York Testing Emergency Alerts Over Xbox, PlayStation, Wii Online Networks
by Elaine Pittman on December 03, 2009
 
To receive alerts about disasters and emergencies, the state is working with Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo — the makers of Xbox, PlayStation and Wii, respectively — to broadcast alerts over the vendors’ online gaming networks.

In January, Microsoft announced that it had sold 28 million Xbox consoles worldwide and its online gaming community, Xbox Live, had grown to more than 17 million members. To provide the ever-growing society of online gamers with a way to receive emergency alerts that doesn’t force them to quit their games, New York is interested in adding an option for people to add gaming networks as a way to receive emergency alerts from NY-Alert.

“We’ve been working with the vendors because we know there are a lot of people in the society — and not just necessarily adolescents or teenagers — but a lot of people are into these community games,” Dennis Michalski, spokesperson for the New York State Emergency Management Office.

NY-Alert is the state’s free, subscription-based alert and notification system. It’s a Web-based portal that allows state agencies, local governments, emergency service agencies and institutions of higher learning to provide emergency information to a defined audience. The official merely needs to type the message into the portal once and it’s disseminated to all the subscribers based on their preferred methods of receiving alerts. According to Michalski, NY-Alert allows officials to send alerts through 17 different gateways, including phone calls, text messages and e-mails.

“This is becoming a very mobile society,” Michalski said. “People just do not rely on sitting by their TV or radio waiting to hear the information through the emergency alert system.”

He said sending alerts through online gaming communities is currently being beta tested, but the state is hoping to go live with the option in the first quarter of 2010. Michalski emphasized that the alerts will be sent just to people who subscribe to them. “If you don’t invite us and you don’t register and include your gaming information, we cannot reach into your game and send any information across,” he said.

New York plans to add new options for alerting the public about emergencies as technology evolves. “We are going to explore every means of how we can disseminate and use these technologies people have to get information to them because disasters don’t occur nine to five, they’re nights and weekends,” Michalski said.

 

HARTFORD — - Text messaging is perfect for casual chatting, but right now it's useless for contacting 911 and will remain so for years, state officials and telecommunication experts testified Wednesday.

"Currently, the ability to text 911 does not exist," Marissa Mitrovich of Verizon Wireless told the state legislature's public safety committee at an informational hearing on using text messages to get police, fire and other emergency assistance. "It will take many years."

The millions of text messages sent daily by cellphone users are handled equally by carriers, so a 911 message could sit for hours before it is delivered. Even then, it's worthless, as dispatch centers don't have the technical capacity to receive it, lawmakers heard.

No one was willing to predict how long it may take state and federal agencies and the national telecommunication industry to resolve the equipment, security and technical roadblocks to 911 texting.

Until then, it's still best to call and talk directly to a dispatcher, said John Danaher, the state's public safety commissioner. A call gives the 911 center the location and callback number of the telephone used and allows the dispatcher to ask questions and get more information, he said.

The hearing was triggered, in part, by the violent death of Alice Morrin, the Vernon woman who was shot to death by her estranged husband, James Morrin, on June 28. Police said Alice Morrin spent the last moments of her life frantically sending text messages to a friend seeking help. James Morrin killed her as police showed up at their house, then committed suicide.

"When I saw the media reports on that incident in Vernon, it touched me," said Rep. Stephen Dargan, D- West Haven, the committee co-chair, said after the meeting. "I'm not familiar with texting. So I thought we could have an informational meeting and learn more about it and 911."

Peter White, director of public policy for AT&T, said 911 texting will be possible when the nation's emergency dispatch system is upgraded from copper-based land lines to a fiber-optic-based system capable of receiving digital information, such as texting and videos.

"That's what's coming sometime in the future," he said. "Until then, if you need help, don't go to Facebook. Don't Twitter. Don't send a text message. Call and talk."

Verizon has programmed its system to discourage customers from 911 texting. When its equipment detects a 911 message, it gives the sender an error message, saying that there is no text service to 911 and that the person should "please make a voice call to 911," Mitrovich said.

At the hearing, Danaher discussed an ambitious state project started three years ago to create a fiber-optic system linking all 107 emergency call centers, hundreds of police, fire and other first-responder stations, the judicial system and medical facilities.

The project, which will cost $58 million over 10 years, is financed by the 47-cent monthly charge paid by land-line phone subscribers to support a new emergency call system.

The first few years of the project were spent planning, but now work has begun installing fiber-optic cable in some Hartford-area towns. All the cable should be installed by 2011 and the system ready to link all the facilities in a secure, digital network that will make sharing information much easier, Danaher said.

The new system also will be able to receive text messages, once national wireless networks and the federal government figure out how to quickly and securely deliver 911 texts to emergency centers. But for a while, the state will be ahead of the curve.

"All we can do is take care of our end of the system," Danaher said. "We'll be ready when 911 texting can be used."