Cannadian Next Generation 911 Allows Photos, Texts, Video to be sent from Scenes
Emergency service internet could allow dispatchers to learn more about an emergency situation
Advocates for Next Generation 911 want smartphone users to not only have the ability to call their local emergency provider but also to send texts, photos and videos.
There are more than 28.4 million wireless phone subscribers in Canada, with more than one in five households having cellphones as their only form of phone service, according to the Canadian Wireless Telecommunications Association. However, adopting and implementing the advanced emergency system is far more complex than hitting "send" to 911.
"Consumers expect to be able to communicate with 911 in much the same way as they communicate with each other through their smartphones," said Brian Fontes, CEO of National Emergency Number Association in Alexandria, Va.
"The unfortunate thing is that most 911 centres — both in Canada and the U.S. and in emergency centres of other parts of the world — are tethered to last-century voice-centric technology."
Next Generation 911 would enable Internet protocol (IP) broadband capabilities, using what's known as emergency service internet, allowing 911 centres the ability to receive voice, video and data, Fontes said.
"The reason that that is important is because as much information as we can gain about the emergency situation, the better the ability to manage the resources that would attend to that emergency."
Eric Torunski, executive director of the Canadian Interoperability Technology Interest Group, said his organization — on behalf of responders — is pushing for a co-ordinated approach to NG911 so that the standards would be the same across Canada.
For one thing, public-safety answering points — or PSAPs, where 911 calls come in — need to be able to seamlessly transfer data from the scene, he noted.
The Industry Council for Emergency Response Technologies is teaming with the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials, Canada to co-host a two-day forum in Toronto this September exploring "the human and technology elements of NG911."
"We're sort of at that precipice, if you will, where most of the components are largely in place and we're just at the edge of beginning to implement," said iCERT executive director George Rice, whose Washington, D.C.-based organization represents public safety and emergency response providers.
"Since we can't simply turn off the 911 system across North America and the Caribbean, we have to have two parallel networks running at one time, meaning the legacy 911 systems will have to run while the IP-based, emergency-calling NG911 systems are built and put in place."
