[UCI-Calit2] Upcoming Event: Advanced Technology in Orange County Public Safety

Anna Lynn Spitzer aspitzer at rgs.uci.edu
Mon Jun 26 09:54:33 PDT 2006


Title:                           Advanced Technology in Orange County
Public Safety
        
Speaker:                     Rich Toro, Orange County Fire Authority 
 
Time:                          2 p.m.
    
Date:                         Friday, June 30, 2006
 
Location:                   Calit2 Building, Room 3008
 
Abstract:                 

Rich Toro's talk will start with a discussion of the technologies
employed by the Orange County Fire Authority in the past, move to a
description of today's operational technologies and then focus on future
requirements.

Orange County's public safety radio system dates back to 1934. Over the
years, additional frequencies were allocated, and sharing of channels
between fire and police became possible. In 1984 the department moved
from 46 MHz communications to an 800 MHz trunked system. Over time,
channels became dedicated to either voice or data (mobile data
services). Voice channels are now reserved for tactical communication
while mobile data channels are used for more routine communications.
Although data rates are low (19.2 kbps), the system works well and
successfully offloads routine communications from voice channels.
Planning is now underway to enable large amounts of data to be
transmitted over the air. Situational awareness and information
dissemination to field units are very important. The vision is "to bring
the office to the incident." It's all about getting the right
information to the right person at the right time during crisis
response.

Rich will also discuss opportunities for ResCUE students to serve as
paid interns for the OCFA under a grant the Authority has recently
received from DHS. Projects of interest include automatic vehicle
location and wireless LAN (licensed band.)

Bio:            

Toro is responsible for advanced information technology and
communications for the Orange County Fire Authority, which serves 22 of
the 32 cities in the second-most populated county of the most populated
state in the U.S. Toro has served for 31 years in public safety
communications in Orange County, the last 18 years for the OCFA.

In the past, Toro has been a 911 operator and 911 communications
supervisor for the OCFA. He is a certified Incident Command System unit
leader. His deployments include the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing as part
of the FEMA urban search and rescue effort. He regularly is responsible
for communications for major fires in Orange County, such as the recent
February 2006 Sierra Fire.

Additional Information:        

This ResCUE seminar is jointly sponsored by Calit2 and the Donald Bren
School of Information and Computer Sciences. For more information,
contact Quent Cassen, 949.824.1741.

 
 
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