Maritime provinces are moving closer to establishing a Maritime-wide mobile radio communication system that will allow emergency responders, including police, fire and paramedics, to talk to each other.
In the age of Facebook and Twitter, iPhones and BlackBerrys, Internet and instant messages, it's hard to believe that emergency responders cannot talk to each other during emergencies.
Aaron Campbell, the director of public safety with the province of Prince Edward Island, says each province now operates an independent mobile radio communication system that is more than two decades old.
He said emergency officials cannot talk to their counterparts in other provinces, and emergency responders in P.E.I. cannot talk to each other.
In some parts of the province where cellular telephone reception is poor, that means little to no communication between emergency responders.
Campbell said that has to change.
The plan is to have the new Maritime-wide radio system in place by 2012.
"If there is a significant motor vehicle accident and the RCMP and city police are responding, people believe that because they are all police officers that they can all talk to each other on their radios," said Campbell.
"That isn't always the case."
Federal Auditor General Sheila Fraser raised the issue of compatible radios for emergency responders in her report released last month, which means this is a national problem.
The scathing report warned that Canada is unprepared to lead a co-ordinated emergency response to a terrorist attack, massive flood or other major disaster.
It's an issue Atlantic premiers identified last year.
In May 2008, the Council of the Atlantic Premiers directed their officials to explore the development of a new communication system.
In August the three Maritime provinces signed a memorandum of understanding to explore the development of a Maritime-wide mobile radio communications system.
Craig Pierre, general manger of Island EMS, said paramedics and all Islanders will benefit from the new Maritime-wide radio system. He said they currently use a combination of a provincial radio system that does not talk to other emergency responders as well as cellphones and pagers.
"It will not only be able to address the issue of us being on a common platform that we can talk to our co-responders but it will give us coverage in areas where we have black spots right now," said Pierre.
"Where it is a Maritime-wide radio initiative, Island EMS travels between New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and P.E.I. on a daily basis. That means enhanced coverage for us when we're actually away from the Island, which adds to the safety issue."
Matthew Hogan, president of the Paramedic Association of P.E.I., said paramedics have all been in a situation where communicating with other emergency responders, like police and fire, is difficult.
"Anything that's going to make it easier for us to communicate with our allied responders will benefit us, and in turn will benefit our patients," said Hogan.
"It's a good investment and it's going to make it easier for us and obviously better for our patients."
The Maritime-wide radio system, if finally established, will serve about 1.8 million people and will be used by about 17,000 emergency service providers.
That includes RCMP, EMS, EMO, provincial sheriff services, and federal departments such as Canadian Forces and National Defence.
About 2,000 users will be based in Prince Edward Island.
A request for proposals is expected in January.
The new system is expected to be a multimillion-dollar investment.
Prince Edward Island's capital budget included an investment of $4.1 million in 2010, with another $1.2 million in 2011 and again in 2012 bringing the total cost for P.E.I. taxpayers to $6.5 million.
Campbell said it is a complex project because it involves three Maritime provinces and multiple emergency service providers.
"In P.E.I., we're in pretty good shape," he said.
"We have a good relationship with all our agencies that we anticipate migrating to the public safety system. We've had an opportunity to do an analysis of their needs and … what their radio requirements are."
Provinces plan Maritime-wide emergency radio system
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- first last
- - June 21st, 2010 at 20:37:44
speaking strictly from the paramedic side, only one of the many listed users of this system, this has potential for tremendous benifits.
Working near a provincial border, if a large MVC happened we would be unable to communicate with the next closest paramedic unit, and having to constantly dial into another dispatch center via cellphone (that we don't carry and don't have phone numbers for the other province anyway) would be very slow and compromising to patient care as we tried to coordinate multiple units arriving, staging area and destinations.
Just traveling the highway and getting flagged down by someone means we have to find someone with a cell phone and get them to call 911 for us. We aren't allowed to actually take the call ourselves anyway. Acting on behalf of a Dr. means you can only provide care in the province you and the Dr. are licensed to work in.
We don't need all one channel, we just need to be able to connect to the different agencies when needed.
Having a system that, if it should break, can actually be repaired and you can get spare parts for would also be reassuring. -
- Anyone Surprised?
- - June 21st, 2010 at 20:33:26
?????
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- krissy
- - June 21st, 2010 at 20:24:59
what about the fire departments? most fire departments outside of city limits are first responders and get called out to medical calls, mvc's, etc....they are usually first on the scene...sometimes before rcmp and defitenly before ambulance, would it not be good for them to be able to get in touch with police and ambulance n let them know of the complete situation?????? and in a recent meeting about this they were supposed to be covered!
why not now? -
- Larry
- - June 21st, 2010 at 20:20:16
And where do they expect the vol. Fire departments to come up with the money to change all their truck and station radios to be of this type. They have small budgets to begin with. If they want it I hope Govt pays for it. Yes it would be Great to have all to be able to access the same channel. but remember it all cost money.
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- Amateur ham Operator
- - June 21st, 2010 at 20:17:04
John from PEI As simple as you think it is to use a cell phone, take a look at how little of this country has coverage. yes a very large percentage of the population has coverage, but the actual percentage of coverage over the WHOLE nation is very very small.
And for instant one-to-many capability cell phones just do not cut it. As well in a disaster, cellular systems are quick to fail due to overload.
Yes it is going to be costly to build but, if done correctly, the benifit of the system is priceless.
For:
Police, Fire, Ambulance, Air Ambulace, EMO, Wildlife Enforcement, SRD, Sheriffs, Hiway/Comercial Enforcement, Hiway Maintanence, Bylaw, Search and Rescue/Urban Search and Rescue, DND(Army, Airforce, Navy, Coast Gaurd), Customs, Electric Companies and probably many more.
The ability to be able to share information at any time with any other group, including themselves, listed above is a priceless tool. These people require this ability to be able to effectively do there jobs on a day to day, hour to hour, minute to minute basis.
During a disaster, this ability is critical to be able to save lives and be able to effectivley provide relief, in a coordinated and efficient manner.
I am willing to bet that the MOST used tool on a Peace Officers utility belt is his/her radio.
To borrow a quote Information IS Everything
If the people that will be using it are listened to before they put out an RFP, and the RPF is properly written, the best proposal is accepted with out consideration to cost (not the cheapest, not the most expensive, but the BEST system) and it functions as proposed, has the coverage that is second to none, then it will be a priceless tool for all users. -
- Head Shaker
- - June 21st, 2010 at 20:14:27
Never try anything.
Always be substandard.
Complain someone else won't do it for you.
It's the island way. -
- chicken
- - June 21st, 2010 at 20:07:56
I think it's a good idea and even better that all 3 provinces are buying it at the same time, which will push costs down for all involved while making it a single system that works for everyone involved.
I don't understand the comment by ''Larry from PEI'' though. Radios are an essential part of the equipment required by fire departments. If your dispatch system and police and ambulance all move to these radios, then it only makes sense for a fire department to buy them as well. I hope the cost is reasonable but how do fire departments pay for gas and trucks and uniforms, etc.? Fundraising and fire taxes. Radios should be no different. -
- Paul
- - June 21st, 2010 at 20:05:21
This sounds like the system that was bought for Victoria BC and has been a complete failure costing $20+ million.
Be careful. Read about it here:
http://www.canada.com/victoriatimescolonist/news/capital_van_isl/story.html?id=7854e907-50a3-412e-9de2-fa233c3c2d2e -
- John
- - June 21st, 2010 at 20:00:09
I'm starting to get that feeling in my stomach again. If we're going to spend over 6 million just to get this thing ready then our system of government just isn't working. Why would emergency people here need to talk to Nova Scotia. But if they did then just use a cell phone. I just want the politicians to know that my feelings about them are slowly changing from disappointment to disdain heading on to out rite hatred.
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- First Responder
- - June 21st, 2010 at 19:57:37
Unfortunatley this news article only tells a small part of the whole story of this radio system initiative, and includes several inaccuracies. For example, the province of Nova Scotia has had a province-wide public safety radio system for ten years which is, in large part, the model for the Maritime-wide project. Only through careful planning, extensive training, daily use, and frequent exercising will the technology being proposed actually resolve the lack of interoperability mentioned in the article. There is no doubt this proposed system will be costly, but there is also no doubt about how essential it is to the health, safety and welfare of Maritimers. I would strongly encourage all first response agencies to take advantage of any information sessions as they are offered in order to make themselves as accurately informed as possible. Do not believe the nay-sayers and do not settle for second-hand information. This project is a case of 'doing the right thing for the right reasons'.
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- Stephen
- - June 21st, 2010 at 19:57:12
Shouldn't this already be a given? Not having it already seems very irresponsible.
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- Tim
- - June 21st, 2010 at 19:48:53
John from PEI, The issue is only partially about Police, fire, and EMS from PEI being able to talk to their counterparts from NB and NS. More importantly, and hopefully of more concern to you is the inability of an RCMP police cruiser responding to a motor vehicle accident in summerside not being able to talk to the responding fire dept, or ambulance. As a volunteer firefighter, Medical First responder, and member of the Canadian Forces based her in Halifax, I can tell you that the inability of emergency responders to talk to one another puts people's lives at risk. One small example for you... last winter I was called to a motor vehicle accident not far from my home. On my wayto the scene, I discovered that the roads were covered in ice, and extremely dangerous. I radioed the responding fire trucks to warn them, but I had no means of contacting the RCMP cruiser, nor the ambulance that was asigned to respond. Fortunately for the paramedics, they were flagged down by the fire truck that had stopped short of te accident scene. unfortunately for the RCMP cruiser, he received no warning, and he wrapped his cruiser around a tree.
The ability to communicate, amongst all first emergency responders is crucial to saving lives, and the safety of the responders. This system will not only provide a common infrastructure amongst the martime provinces, but it will allow responders from NS and NB to operate if called upon to deploy to PEI for a major disaster.
For Larry from PEI, You make a very good point. Funding for this project must come from the Federal and Provincial governments. It cannot be left to individual volunteer fire depts to comue up with the money to replace equipment.
