Archive

Upgrades to emergency communications needed to eliminate liability and safety concerns in Orangeville, Dufferin: consultant

August 18, 2022   ·   0 Comments

By Sam Odrowski

A communications review for emergency services in Orangeville and Dufferin County found numerous issues with the current system.

Phil Crnko of consultancy company, Black Castle Networks, delivered a presentation of the review to Council last Monday (Aug. 8), with the message that corrective action should be taken immediately to fix concerns around health and safety, 9-1-1 operations, and liability.

At Headwaters Hospital, the commercial area north of Orangeville, and industrial area, there have been numerous anecdotes from first responders on communications issues when receiving or making calls, said Crnko.

Through Black Castle Networks analysis, they found that changes to radio infrastructure within the town are necessary to remedy concerns of 9-1-1 interoperability, mutual aid, and continuity of operations.

“[It] is very important, in our company’s opinion, that we remedy these issues. They are potential liability for line of duty deaths, and also just are important from a stance of efficiency and 9-1-1 operations,” said Crnko.

When looking at interoperability with fire departments and neighbouring areas, both Dufferin and Caledon first responders had a number of concerns during staff interviews, such as problems with basic radio reception, power levels, and how infrastructure is set up.

Incompatibilities were identified, along with issues in the way radio systems were engineered.

“So today, there is a bit of a disparate, sort of patchwork quilt of radio systems within the county. And certainly, they do both impact county operations as well as mutual aid with the Town of Orangeville, and also in times of need,” said Crnko.

“First responder agencies will go to the assistance of their neighboring counterparts, and so this certainly impacts continuity of operations, and in our opinion, is a serious issue for both health and safety of 9-1-1 operators and field staff, but also for the community in terms of effective response for 911 calls.”

Caledon is Orangeville’s primary response partner and operates on a different system, which creates less efficiency, Crnko noted.

He also highlighted the incomplete and fragmented county wide communications system, which could be rectified by implementing a simulcast system, that would provide radio frequency (RF) coverage across Orangeville and Dufferin.

Crnko said the county and town operate in silos, making for a lack of inter site linkages that would permit communication to the south when emergency responders are arriving on the scene from the north and vice versa. There’s also no way of linking digitally with neighbouring systems.

There’s potential for RF self-interference issues while paging volunteer firefighters as well, Crnko noted.

Legacy analog Land Mobile Radio (LMR) technology is used at a number of sites locally, but it should be upgraded to digital technology to improve interoperability, said Crnko.

Radio frequency coverage gaps are due to the communication system’s original design. It is not properly spaced out to provide optimal coverage and power levels pose a concern, according to Crnko.

In terms of design issues, there’s no county wide equipment or replacement strategy, and the system has no data capability.

“As first responders, the wave of the future is the use of data in addition to voice communications for efficient 911 response,” Crnko noted.

He said over the next three to five years, people will be able to use text messages and video calls to contact 9-1-1 for an emergency, and digitizing the current system will be necessary to facilitate this process.

A number of single points of failure within the backhaul design and system design for Orangeville and Dufferin County were noted by Crnko.

He added that the unencrypted nature of the current LMR system for first responders’ communications opens it up to the public or hackers who can access communications through radio scanners, creating a cybersecurity problem.

Meanwhile, a lack of on-site spares for the communications system puts it at risk of extended outages.

“If you don’t have a critical part that’s available if a breakage occurs, especially in this day and age of sourcing issues, you essentially could put the system at risk for multi-day outages,” said Crnko. “So we strongly recommend a new posture for operations going forward.”

The solution proposed by Black Castle Networks to modernize and rectify these issues within the current system is a two site LMR conventional refresh for Orangeville and a land mobile radio core network. This will provide the ability to link other radio sites, within Dufferin County and Caledon, as well as improve operability.

There are a number of grant funding opportunities for these upgrades that Orangeville is eligible for.

During the Aug. 8 council meeting, a motion was unanimously approved that authorizes town staff to pursue grant funding for initiatives related to upgrading local telecommunications systems.

Crnko said there’s a healthy amount of funding available to help offset capital investment costs.

The financial benefits of implementing the system wide upgrades include removing potential legal liabilities that may come from using the existing radio system if it were to fail or endure issues.

“The issues, as noted, were chronic and long standing. There are potential liabilities for line of duty deaths, but also just impacting the effectiveness of 9-1-1 field operations,” said Crnko.

“So we recommend strongly that we remedy those as soon as possible. They will ultimately improve community safety and wellbeing with better 9-1-1 outcomes and better digital communications for 9-1-1 operations.”

Readers Comments (0)