Toneless

For the first time in a bajillion years, my agency does not transmit station tones over the radio when dispatching a call. Personally, I think that the tones may come back at some point in the future, but I could be wrong about that. It wouldn't be the first time.

For quite some time, our agency has been switching over to the Westnet First-in Station Alerting System. In a nutshell, the Westnet system sends the alert information through the hard wire communication system rather than over the air. This allows more information to be sent, faster and without tying up air time. The increased amount of information is processed in a small computer located in the station and allows for a high degree of customization of the dispatch information. The voice information is still sent out over the air as well as over the hard wire system.

The transition process started with the construction of a new station, then was expanded when several stations were remodeled. When additional stations were built, they were equipped with the new systems, a few more remodels  and a grant allowed all of the stations to be brought on-line.

The transition process was not without problems, integration between the new and the old did not always go smoothly. Some of the issues were hardware, some were personnel. As we control neither, resolution was not always easy. The completion of the install should eliminate most problems once the new procedures have been learned.

Firefighters love the First-in system as it allows them to customize how they receive the call. For example, each dorm room as an adjustable volume control and can be programmed to activate by unit rather than by station. As most of our stations have individual dorms rooms, each room will now be programmed to be alerted to sound when the individual unit is dispatched. The truckies will not be awakened when the squad is sent to pick up that pissy wino at three AM.

The system also includes a multi-colored lighting module that can be programmed to light a different  color by unit. When the engine is sent, a red LED light segment illuminates, when the squad goes a blue segment lights up the truck gets green and the chief is signaled by yellow. The system does a bunch of other stuff which I won't go into here - it is a remarkable system, one that I enjoyed using.

Where I think there may be an issue, is when units are out in the field, monitoring a radio or HT. Most of us are programmed to recognize our station tones and therefore can tell the difference between an incident and routine traffic while focused on other tasks such as training or inspections. We could hear our station tone as well as the ambulance company's and the tones of neighboring stations. The tones were usually broadcast at a louder volume than the voice, which allowed us to easily filter routine traffic from dispatches.

Under the old system, a call was pre-alerted, the tones were sent and then the dispatch information was broadcast. It went something like this:

"Thirteen, AMR medical aid."

A pause of a few seconds.

"Beep beeeeeeeep, beep beeeeeeeeep." (these tones were significantly louder than the voice information)

 Another pause, maybe a second or so, depending on what else the dispatcher had going.

"Attention engine 13, AMR - 2455 Corrigan way, 2-4-5-5 Corrigan way with a cross street of Brubaker lane. This will be at Dingleberry's market, a medical aid for a fall victim. Map page 78 D-4"

Under the new broadcast procedure, the pre-alert and tones were replaced by three short beeps, followed by the voice dispatch:

"Beep beep beep."

"Attention engine 13, AMR - 2455 Corrigan way, 2-4-5-5 Corrigan way with a cross street of Brubaker lane. This will be at Dingleberry's market, a medical aid for a fall victim. Map page 78 D-4"

Obviously, the incident will get out much faster and the quality of the dispatch information that gets into the station will be much improved.  In the field, who knows?

I think that losing the tones over the radio will cause a few calls to be missed as the three short beeps are generic, not station specific and will get lost in the clutter of radio traffic. That alone will not cause the tones to be brought back, another factor will likely be more instrumental in their return.

It will be far more difficult for the day chiefs to differentiate fire calls from the more routine medical calls. The string of tones for multiple station responses are no longer available, all calls sound the same - whether for a lock-out or for a structure fire. The chiefs are likely to miss a few calls , especially when they are engrossed in their work. If this becomes a big enough issue, the old station tones will be broadcast along with the new First-In system.

I loved the First-In alerting system, but I relied upon the tones when in the field. It no longer matters to me, but others relied upon the tones as well. It will be interesting to see if they will be missed enough to return them to the dispatch process.

Only time will tell.

Thanks for reading,
Schmoe