KY Volunteer Firefighters Battling Communications Dead Spots

Officials are still looking for ways to address areas of the county where county firefighters aren’t receiving notifications on their pagers.

The issue has to do with pagers used with the city and county’s digital radio system for police, firefighters and first responders. The areas that are not receiving pager notifications are around Yelvington.

County Fire Chief Jeremy Smith said volunteer firefighters are receiving radio communications, but that additional information is sent on pagers. But in certain areas near Yelvington, the pager information isn’t received.

The pagers used in the county are made by one company, Unication.

Smith said other communities have similar problems with blind spots in their digital radio systems.

“It’s not just a problem here,” Smith said. “It’s a problem across the U.S.”

That hasn’t impacted firefighter response, Smith said, because firefighters are also getting notifications from 911 dispatch on their cell phones. But not getting pager information could mean a firefighter knows the call type and address, but doesn’t receive details sent though a page, such as a message that a response to the scene is no longer needed, Smith said.

“To my knowledge, there have not been any calls missed, and I would know,” Smith said.

Smith said the company that installed the digital 911 system has conducted a study to determine areas where pagers are not working.

Smith said officials could implement short-term solutions, such as adding an extra feature to the Active911 systems on their phones.

But a more permanent solution will be needed, Smith said.

Possible long-term solutions could include “another tower site” to transmit signals from dispatch to the pagers, or by adding transmission equipment to existing towers, Smith said.

“We do know this is an issue and we are trying to find ways to overcome this,” Smith said.

“We will address it for sure and move forward from there,” Smith said.

Overall, the digital radio system provides much better coverage of the county than the outdated VHF system it replaced, Smith said.

“Our communication radio to radio, and being able to talk to people across the county is just amazing,” Smith said. “It is almost impossible to get 100% (coverage), but we are over 90%, when we use to be (about) 60%.”

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Visit the Messenger-Inquirer (Owensboro, Ky.) at www.messenger-inquirer.com

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