Innovative Interoperability Answers

     Radio interoperability remains a pressing challenge for U.S. public safety agencies. Fortunately, the state of the art in this area has advanced significantly, allowing smaller departments to cost-effectively solve their problems and improve their communications capabilities. Here are two examples of innovative interoperable solutions in use today.

Tillamook Co.'s MCCV
     Located on the Oregon coast, Tillamook County covers 1,125 square miles, including 500,000 acres of national forest. With a population of about 25,380, it's a rural area, and its mix of lowland farms and rugged mountains presents real challenges to county emergency officials.

     To enhance its public safety communications, Tillamook County recently purchased a mobile command/communications vehicle (MCCV) from National Interop (www.nationalinterop.com). The MCCV is a truck-drawn trailer that serves two purposes: First, it can act as a field communications center for mutual aid incidents in rural and remote areas. Second, it is equipped with three call-taker dispatch positions, allowing it to replace a crippled dispatch center in a pinch.

     "We don't have a lot of radio repeater sites in our jurisdiction," says deputy Don Taylor of the Tillamook County Sheriff's Department. "The MCCV helps us bridge this RF gap. Thanks to its satellite uplink, we can connect to the Web for e-mail and other data. We can also use the MCCV to support RoIP."

     RoIP is Radio over IP, a version of Voice over IP. In layman's terms, RoIP allows different radio systems to interconnect to each other over a network, typically back at a central hub at headquarters. The MCCV connects to this hub by satellite, which allows it to seamlessly link all the different agencies responding to a situation. The result: instant interoperability, with a solid connection back to county offices.

     "RoIP has already taken the military by storm, but it's only just now moving into the public safety market," says David Billstrom, owner of National Interop. "It allows us to patch together disparate radio systems at the network level and create mutual aid talk groups on the fly. With RoIP, you don't have to take an audio bridge to the scene—everything can be handled back at your dispatch center."

     "We work with all kinds of different agencies in mutual aid situations, including the Coast Guard," says Taylor. "RoIP gives us the ability to communicate with them and other agencies quickly and easily."

     One interesting point: Tillamook County's MCCV has enough onboard battery power to run all systems for more than three hours before needing connection to exterior power. This allows the unit to start operations within 10 minutes of arrival, without losing time connecting and activating generators.

     So how did Tillamook County select National Interop? As it turns out, company employees are also part of a group of rescue volunteers who bring assistance and ham radio communications to mountain incidents. "We see them at a lot of rescues," Taylor says. "We got to talking about Tillamook County's communications needs and asked for their advice. As it turns out, National Interop had built a good reputation for its work for other public-safety agencies. That's why we decided to give them a try."

     Today, radio communications have been vastly improved in Tillamook County, thanks to their new MCCV. "It was a good choice," says Taylor. "The MCCV is working well for us."

Westford Fire Department's AWINS
     Located in historic Westford, MA, the Westford Fire Department (WFD) can trace its roots back to 1892—that was when the town hired its first forest fire wardens. Its first three fire stations followed the next year.