Along with my staff in the Arlington, Va., 9-1-1 Emergency Communications Center (ECC), I was intimately involved in the response to the 9/11 terrorist attack on the Pentagon, and hardly a day goes by that I don’t think at least once of that horrific day. Five years have passed, and, although the incident was by many reports — including the 9/11 Commission Report—handled well, there were lessons learned, lessons reinforced and actions taken, locally and throughout the nation, to better prepare communities to deal with disasters of all manner and type in the future. Many of these actions I believe have already improved public safety communications every day, on every incident—big and small, routine and exceptional. Some of the improvements probably would not have occurred were it not for 9/11.

First, there is a new awareness of and appreciation for the vital role that 9-1-1 calltakers and dispatchers — as the first of the first responders — play in providing public safety services to homeland security and hometown security.

Next, the successful response to the Pentagon was largely possible because a highly refined Initial Aid agreement – commonly referred to as the NOVA (for Northern Virginia) agreement — has been in effect for more than 30 years and utilized by the fire departments of Arlington County, Fairfax County, the city of Alexandria and other departments within these jurisdictions. Plus, there’s an equally well-established mutual aid agreement for the entire metropolitan Washington, D.C., area.

The NOVA agreement is put into action many times each day. The closest unit(s) is dispatched to an incident, regardless of jurisdiction. Units are selected on the basis of location, incident type, predetermined unit assignment and availability. To facilitate this dispatch and response strategy, common unit identifiers are used and preceded by a specific jurisdiction identifier.

A common 800-MHz radio system is utilized throughout the region. Cross programming of radio channels allows for seamless radio communications interoperability. The “home” communications center of the jurisdiction in which the incident is located is the communications center primarily responsible for all units dispatched. The area also uniformly employs the Incident Command System.

These factors all allowed for the 9/11 Pentagon incident to be handled in much the same way as a routine apartment fire would be handled — except for the magnitude of the event. This system reinforces the operational and economic value of cooperation and planning, often referred to as “playing well in the sandbox together.”

Interoperability Issues
Prior to 9/11, the term radio interoperability was virtually unheard of outside the public safety community. Now, it is widely used and — more importantly — understood in government circles and by the general public. This has led to a significant effort to improve the ability of all public safety agencies — at local, state and national levels — to more seamlessly communicate with each other when the need arises.

However, for interoperability to be most effective, more radio frequency (RF) spectrum must be available for public safety use. Fortunately, a coalition of public safety associations (including APCO), organizations and equipment manufacturers, successfully lobbied the U.S. Congress to establish a specific date (Feb. 17, 2009) by which the previously approved 24 MHz of additional 700-MHz RF will be released for use by public safety to further interoperability. Twenty-four MHz is greater than the sum total of all RF previously assigned to public safety.

A major improvement since 9/11 has been the adoption of the National Incident Management System (NIMS) and the inclusion of dispatch personnel in the training and use of NIMS. NIMS has provided a uniform and cohesive way in which incidents are managed.

To further enhance incident response and management, attention must also be given to the operational aspect of interoperability, including improved planning and cooperation among public safety agencies, uniform use of common terms, programming the radio channels assigned to one agency into other agencies’ radios, the use of unified incident command in which various agencies representing multiple disciplines operate at a common incident, etc. In this regard, there has been significant improvement.

Enhanced Communications
Since 9/11, many public safety agencies have acquired mobile command vehicles to assist in managing incidents on scene, focusing particularly on the communications aspect of the incident. Having public safety telecommunicators serve as incident tactical dispatchers has proven very effective and has placed dispatchers “on scene.”

Fortunately, the security of comm centers has been given new attention and, in many cases, greatly improved. And the training of 9-1-1 calltakers and dispatchers has expanded and improved to include awareness of issues previously not encountered.

These are some of the things that have helped better prepare and improve public safety communications during the past five years. However, none is more important than the need to continually focus on staffing communications centers with well-trained, dedicated and career-oriented personnel.

About the Author
Steve Souder is the director of the Fairfax County (Va.) Department of Public Safety Communications. On Sept. 11, 2001, he was the administrator of the Arlington County, Va., 9-1-1 Emergency Communications Center. In this role he was responsible for the fire-rescue, police and EMS communications at the Pentagon. Contact him at [email protected] or 703/280-0528.

Originally published in Public Safety Communications, 72(9):30-31, September 2006.