Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Ambulance crews can zero in on new cellular phones

From: [email-masked]
Date: Sun, 05 Oct 2003 03:54:18 -0400

Story last updated at 7:45 a.m. Saturday, October 4, 2003
Ambulance crews can zero in on new cellular phones
Advanced technology tells dispatchers latitude, longitude of
callers to 911

BY DENESHIA GRAHAM

Of The Post and Courier Staff

Most times, when dispatcher Jacquiline Brathwaite receives an emergency call from
a cell phone, she has to ask a lot of questions to determine where in Charleston
County the caller is before she can send help.

But a local cellular provider has new technology that promises to make
Brathwaite's job as senior medical dispatcher a good bit easier.

Nextel is currently offering Assisted Global Positioning System (AGPS) compatible
phones that work with the Charleston County Emergency Medical Service's
dispatching equipment, allowing ambulance crews to find a caller much more
quickly.
Nextel's compatible phones use satellite technology to let dispatchers determine a
caller's longitude and latitude, which can -- in most cases -- pinpoint the
caller's street and block.

"I think it's a benefit because we receive a lot of cell phone calls," said
Brathwaite, a senior medical dispatcher who works for the county's Emergency
Medical Services.
While the county doesn't track the number of assistance calls made from cell
phones, the number has been growing.

Nationally, more than 155,000 wireless calls are made to 911 and other emergency
numbers each day, said Randy Fletcher, district manager for South Carolina Nextel.
There are about 146 million wireless phones nationwide.

All wireless phone companies are required by the Federal
Communications Commission to have 95 percent of their customers with AGPS
compatible phones by December 2005, Fletcher said.

The first step toward meeting this requirement began in 1998 and required wireless
companies to transmit to dispatchers a caller's phone number and the general area
where they're calling from based on the tower's location. Some wireless phones are
compliant.
This information, however, wouldn't tell exactly where the caller is located, said
Capt. Chip Hlavacek, communications supervisor with county EMS.

Nextel is the first local carrier to move on to phase two, which requires that a
caller's latitude and longitude be transmitted along with phase one information.

"We love it. They're the first one to break the ground," Hlavacek said. Of 100
test calls performed by the county in a week, only two were inaccurate, he said.
The county began upgrading its equipment in 1998, upon purchase of its
computer-aided dispatch system that was already compatible with AGPS phones.
There's no additional cost to the county; the upgrades are part of the annual
maintenance agreement for computer equipment, Hlavacek said.

Nextel phones are completely digital and don't provide coverage for all of South
Carolina, particularly in rural areas. The company's phone models I58 and I88 are
AGPS compatible and cost $150 and $140, respectively. "There's really no
difference in pricing," between regular and compatible phones, Fletcher said.

Nextel still sells phones without AGPS. Fletcher doesn't know when only AGPS
phones will be offered, but the new line of Motorola phones -- the first one to be
available before the end of the year -- will all have the feature, he said.

http://www.charleston.net/stories/100403/loc_04911.shtml

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