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Permalink Reply by Russ on September 23, 2010 at 11:09pm

i broached this subject when i was in dispatch and we just got our 800 radios. i suggested that any unit on the scene that declaired and emergency gets a clear channel and operations are immidieatly switched to another channel. the "PTSBD" (people that sit behind desks) decided, "no we need to call them and confirm if its real". i asked what do you think will happen if "somebody has a gun in their face" and after the red button is pressed over the lapel mic comes " Medic 1-(soon to be medic dead) "you activated your emergecy button is everything ok?" the bad guy looks out the window and sees the BIG NUMBER ON THE AMBULANCE and puts it together. the PTSBD ASSURED me that "bad guys dont look out of windows at a time like that"....WELL... it happend to a crew and they were rightly pissed about being asked instead of recieving a police response. I learned in a critical dispatch class that dispatchers sometimes need to be "backup" for the troops in the field

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Permalink Reply by Fireyladd - Retired Chief Sharp on September 23, 2010 at 11:19pm

Good discussion item. Made me think about what we do or would do in this case. We dont have a code or special designator for such a situation. BUT WE WILL NOW! Thanks !

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Permalink Reply by John Crabbe on September 23, 2010 at 11:25pm

I have a feeling they way I would like to see this develop is for dispatch to say nothing at all and just listen to see what is going on.

Chances are if an activation occured, dispatch won't know what is happening, the radio most likely doesn't go to open mike so dispatch won't hear anything going on, what they do know is an alarm button was activated.

The problem with many such buttons is the inadvertant activation, but one should also realize that dispatch does know the call you are on too, so a policy can be developed as to how dispatch responds. As I mentioned for us, the BC is notified.

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Permalink Reply by John Karl Ambrusch, III on September 24, 2010 at 8:49am

Actually, I'm a dispatcher for the county and when the activation goes off, the mic stays open so dispatch can hear everything that's going on without cluing any one else in on what happening. Otherwise, if t's accidental, we just check to see if they're okay and tell them to reset it.

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Permalink Reply by Daniel Efaw on September 25, 2010 at 3:42pm

Our county just recently went to the Trunking radio system and all of the trunking radios have an emergency button that the policy is click the button and turn down your radio and within minutes you have assistance of all sorts

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Permalink Reply by cadet 911 on September 25, 2010 at 6:23pm

that what my dept use and the police use it too

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