11 June 2021
Rhiannon Beeson, APD Communications & the British APCO executive committee
The path to transforming control rooms operations with ESN and LTE communications.
As the UK ushers in a new era of LTE communications with their Emergency Services Network (ESN), Rhiannon Beeson of APD Communications and the British APCO executive committee shares her insights and advice for organisations upgrading to the ground-breaking technology.
“Technology is important, but we must always remember that it’s a tool to improve public safety”, says Rhiannon.
In your experience working with control rooms, how are people feeling about ESN?
We know that the emergency services and organisations in the critical control field are excited by the promise of unprecedented access to data and new applications. The potential benefits are huge. However, in migrating to the technology, organisations are very aware of the scale of the project and the operational risks associated.
Their first priority is their continued commitment to public safety.
We’ve worked with our customers to create a 3-step approach. The first is ‘Getting Ready For ESN’. This involves preparing your technology and suppliers, communicating and preparing your people and ensuring we understand the changes in processes too. The second phase is ‘Business As Usual’, continuing to save lives and serve the public is our top priority. And the final phase is ‘Getting Value from ESN’, which is where we discover new applications, access to data and a more connected public service.
Our collaborative and phased approach was so powerful, we created a webinar series and free resources to spread the word, they are completely free to download and available to everyone. They’ve really helped people embrace the change.
You mentioned the ‘Getting Ready For ESN’ phase, what does this look like?
The UK currently uses the TETRA radio network for critical communication, location and a small amount of data. There are a large number of devices and applications that connect to this network to connect the whole organisation together.
The handheld radios are an example of the devices that need to be discontinued at some point, so organisations need to procure enough to last through the migration. Too many and they’ve wasted money. Too few and they cause a critical communication breakdown. So organisations need to assess their current stock, replacement rates and calculate how many they need. ‘Handset pool partnerships’ protect the public purse.
When you consider getting the control room ready, the first challenge is the almost-obsolete Motorola software called Centracom/Vortex, which only runs on Windows 7, an already obsolete Microsoft operating system. We highly recommend embracing the upgrades to ‘Dispatch Communication Server’ (DCS) and windows 10 ahead of any migration to ESN. This allows the replacement of complex analogue technology that occupies a large amount of space and power in server rooms and shifts towards modern IP-Based technology.
Inside the control room you have voice recorders, dispatch, maps, voice comms and location software and hardware. Organisations have to ensure their suppliers are prepared on time, otherwise they may need to run new procurement exercises.
But ‘Getting Ready for ESN’ isn’t just about technology, current operational procedures and processes have to be considered. For example, if you have a mixture of LTE and TETRA handsets, do front line staff carry two handsets? Which one should they use? How does the control room know who to contact and on what network? How do they interact with each other in a major incident? Understanding these, and many more questions, helps to communicate and prepare the people involved in adopting and embracing the change, too.
That sounds complex. What are you doing to help control rooms get to ‘Business As Usual’?
I previously mentioned the webinars and free resources we’ve created that you can access via our website, but we are also working with suppliers like EE, Telent and Red Box to help everyone prepare for the change.
We’ve prepared detailed and tailored ‘Ready For ESN’ reports, including a high-level RAG (red, amber, green) status, highlighting what each organisation has completed and still needs to be done.
We’ve also created a full five-phase migration plan which recommends which teams should migrate first, when and why, along with a series of risk gates that you need to pass through to continue your roll out. It’s pretty comprehensive and provides an idea as to how to manage the migration.
As we get through the ‘Business As Usual’ phase, what do you think the future benefits will be from ESN and LTE technology for mission critical organisations?
The improvements in bandwidth to devices will open up a whole new world of possibilities. New applications will start to appear that provide front line teams with real time insights and information. Video streaming directly to the control room will become ubiquitous from body worn video, drones and vehicles.
We will start to see interactions between vehicles and devices such as aircraft, vehicles (V2X), IOT and drones to improve communication, situational awareness and public safety significantly. And we will see the technology being used to improve response times and reduce costs through the automated dispatch of drones instead of helicopters in certain circumstances.
The future of public safety and the emergency services looks bright through the adoption of industry leading LTE technology and the adoption of the ESN network is an exciting future for us all.
