New Dispatch Vs old SOC

[mack]

Maybe handballing SES CRD to SES SCC for the entirety of a obviously crap fire danger day would be SENSIBLE.

I believe that the SES SCC was open all day... Andrew?

[bajdas]

Maybe handballing SES CRD to SES SCC for the entirety of a obviously crap fire danger day would be SENSIBLE.

I believe that the SES SCC was open all day... Andrew?

Need more info on what 'Zippy' was implying or wanting to change.

System worked as per business rules agreed between SES & MFS. The trigger yesterday was 7 calls received within 7 minutes at approx 1715.

Yesterday,
** one to two people were monitoring in SES SCC from 1000 onwards.
** the SES state duty officer was at CFS SOC as a liason officer, thus each CFS hourly briefing paper was distributed to everyone. This include Bureau of Meterology (BoM) updates.
** SES staff on 30 minute recall for 'State Emergency Operations Centre'. I think this activated from 1530 onwards.
** SES Hook truck sent to Kangaroo Island to assist in logistics. I understand CFS Region 3 Hook truck already over there with Salvo's Catering truck.
** Other SES resources assisting at the fires.

At approximately 1700, a full SES volunteer crew was paged to respond to SES SCC in anticipation that 132500 call taking would be needed. Ths was a result of BoM updates of risk to Adelaide and current Whyalla incidents.

I cannot remember exactly when, but approx 1720 the MFS formally requested SES SCC takeover CRD for 132500. This happened within a few minutes because the volunteer crew was already in the SES SCC.

I think SES Central Region Operations Centre (ROC) was fully manned by 1800.

All SES Central Region LHQ's activated with at least Operations crew at 1850.

Five volunteers staffed the incoming telephone lines until approximately 1930, taking approximately 70 taskings. Many calls received regards fires & power outages were transferred to other agencies. Thus I would estimate 100 calls in two hours.

The SAAS Incident Room opened during the afternoon as well.

SES SCC & SES Central ROC was staffed by 14 (maybe more) people during the two hours.

Some volunteers stood down at 1950. I was one of them because I returned to work to complete some of my evening shift at work. But was on 10 minute recall.

Unknown when SES SCC & SES Central ROC closed.

I have some of my gear with me at work today in case required. This was requested yesterday, but we have not been called.

[big bronto]

well i am thinking this topic has been bashed so many times by so many people it is getting boring. bottom line if you have never worked in comms you clearly have no idea and although in your little world of "we are the only fire brigade around" in a lot of cfs cases you may think you have the knowledge sadly you do not. Have any of you thought maybe we could make the comms operators jobs easier by doing our own pager tests on a monday night or do not talk so much on the radio, keep radio messages short and informative to assist in workloads of the comms operators.

[jaff]

big bronto theres probably a reason its been bashed so many times,not only are volunteers pissed off that the CRD was rushed through without the appropriate procedures in place meaning that they had to be "developed on the run in an adhoc manner",these are the words of one of your comms operators.
 
Also if im reading these posts and the issue registers properly the sops that have been implemented and accepted by both services are seemingly, regularly not adheered too, causing angst and frustration amongst the troops.

CFS doesnt have a UFU style union but if we did ,no way would we put up with the crap we are regularly dealt,would MFS put up with it ? no frigging way!
The last couple of days could just be a taste of whats to come, with the coming fire season, and we would like to know that things were well under way to being resolved,well theres still obviously some issues that need to be dealt with!!

I agree that our comms are a not as proficent as they possibly could be,and in house that is something that we have been put on notice about and will continue to try to improve,but it will take time as most brigades train weekly for only a couple of hours,so perhaps excuse us if we look upon operators that practice 40 hrs plus a week and continue to make simple errors with exasperation.

You may look upon the critisism levelled at the CRD as an insult to your "professionialism" ,I just see it as a threat to the safety of myself and other crews whilst on the fireground and I would be remiss in my duty if I didnt complain loud and clear!!!! so endeth the sermon.

[6739264]

If everyone is bashing the CRD, maybe your anger and comments should be leveled at those people in CFS and SAFECOM who implemented it, rather than the poor SAMFS comms operators. Its very easy to say and many have here "Oh MFS operators are terrible and they are idiots etc etc" Its hard to be proficient at your job when you are working with a brand new, and already deficient system.

Now the perfect solution would be a commcen that was merely a large floor area, with SAMFS comms, SACFS comms, SES SCC all working from the same databases, yet with their own separate areas so that they all deal with their own service. Yet they would be close enough to be able to communicate without ringing each other or needing liaison officers to drive around town to another building.

Dare I suggest a purpose built building, housing SAPol and SAAS comms as well. Then we could have all emergency services working off the same page and would cut out 99% of the crap that goes on.

Its a pipe dream but oh well.

[Zippy]

Something im noticiing more and more...(Not the operators, rather the System) is that Multiple Higher Alarm CFS Incidents often is the cause to degradation in the system.  During these busy times ive also noticed random requests for paging of so and so to respond to a smoke sighting in a area...

Wouldnt *000 only* for inital incident reporting be a good SOP? rather than blocking up regional channels.

Something that i have seen that is good about the Bom's system is the Daily Incident number....perhaps once the Inital Incident Response is completed, Only the use of Airsource is used to paging further resources?

Bom's isnt designed for campaign fires right?

my todays 2 cents view on things

[rusty]

Well, despite all the bashings, criticisms, and some positive reinforcement, Adelaide Fire had its mettle tested well and truly on Thursday. I'd like to congratulate them on an amazing job under such intense circumstances. There has been some really good feedback, although I know that not everything went 100%, I'm guessing that many people expected, maybe wanted, it to fail. Region 1 never even activated their own resource tracking.
MFS put extra staff on for the conditions, had every phone in Comcen staffed and had the right people in the right positions.
I was in there on the day, and wish to publicly thank all the Adel Fire operators on a brilliant job.

On another front, a BOMS upgrade is due for release on Monday, which will allow operators to search for and input requested Brigades by full name, rather than short name (4 letter abbrev.) This should speed up your alerts calls and dispatches. ie, operator enters full name and BOMS converts it to callsign.

Rusty

[6739264]

Just quietly, maybe it was a good thing that R1 never started resource tracking...

[chook]

liked your idea of all the comcens in one big room - seperate desks with a common data base.
I thought the people at Adelaide Fire did a fantastic job - we had multiple taskings by page and phone, no dramas from the guys at all, well done .
Interestingly though we have been told to only acknowledge the page through them, from then on we do everything locally, don't even have to tell them when a task is complete. And we never use them for test calls to pagers, thats what the GRN paging service is for, or Paging software.
I would be filtered annoyed if someone rang me on a day like that wanting test pages or to pass on some message about a christmas parties etc.
Again well done Adelaide Fire!
cheers

[bajdas]

...
Now the perfect solution would be a commcen that was merely a large floor area, with SAMFS comms, SACFS comms, SES SCC all working from the same databases, yet with their own separate areas so that they all deal with their own service. Yet they would be close enough to be able to communicate without ringing each other or needing liaison officers to drive around town to another building.

Dare I suggest a purpose built building, housing SAPol and SAAS comms as well. Then we could have all emergency services working off the same page and would cut out 99% of the crap that goes on.

Its a pipe dream but oh well.

Not so much a pipe dream.....have a look at the new multi-storey building being built on the corner of Angus St & Victoria Square...SA Waters new headquarters...very close to the existing SAGRN fibre loop.

The challenge will be moving SAFECOM SACAD to the new facility from MFS Comcen...will the UFU members move to SAFECOM ??

** MY OPINION ONLY ** Everyone is wanting someone to blame...how about accept that this combined CRD Centre was dictated 2 years ago. Some people are stating this was a rushed job...but I think it was caused by people against the concept...then they were forced to do the job they should have started 2 years before.

Everyone is wanting someone to blame...how about accept the change & work with it.

[Alan (Big Al)]

Perhaps if GO's and the like stopped using MFS like this :

1909110 14:29:37 08-12-07 MFS: THREE MORE CREW REQUIRED FOR WAROOKA INCIDENT SIGNED BAROSSA GROUP OFFICER 08/12/2007 2:29:27 PM CFS Barossa Group Info

and used link instaed some of the pressure might come off the comms guys.

I personally thinks MFS do a pretty good job and we've only had one MFS operator sound like he had no radio training at all, the rest are brilliant and to the point.

[SA Firey]

Would also help lighten the workpoad if they used Link to page out or had all Group Bases fitted with Airsource...and yes I know it isnt available but CFS HQ has the licensed copy

[Firefrog]

Licensing isn't an issue the company that owned Airsource went broke and no longer exists.....

I thought Airsource was everywhere already. I know of brigades that have officers using it from home for admin and info paging.

But you are right that the CRD centre should not be receiving phone calls to request the sending of a low priority pager message.

[chook]

You can also use Notepager pro $29 US (approx) - works the same, can import Airsource settings etc. Has a bit of a problem with Vista sometimes though.
cheers

[gj41]

We should not be knocking the operators in the MFS/CFS control centre. They are just trying to implement a system (if you can call it that) which was imposed on them by a Minister who has no idea whatsoever, and who was probably ill-advised by others who have no idea as well.

Thursday was just a taste of things to come. I am informed that 000 to MFS jammed up and appliances responding to incidents could not raise Adelaide Fire by telephone or radio. Too bad for those requiring incidents upgraded to 2nd or 3rd alarm when they are unable to staff their own radio due to lack of volunteers (now I wonder what could be the cause of that?)

But here's the crunch. Mt. Lofty Fire Tower is now not permitted to contact Adelaide Fire to advise of smoke sightings - they now must call 000!!! Too bad if 000 is jammed up again. Might as well close the tower down if it cannot function effectively and quickly.

This system could possibly be made to work, but it needs someone who actually has the skills to design the system and then implement it with full staff, training and equipment. This is different to having people who think they have the skills cooking up what we currently have.

At the end of this fire season, there needs to be a full enquiry as to how and why the amalgamation was introduced, and the results of that amalgamation in terms of volunteer frustration, and possibly more serious consequences, particularly when appliances require assistance urgently.

The Minister gave the direction to amalgamate with no understanding whatsoever of the issues involved. It's time she went!

[6739264]

But here's the crunch. Mt. Lofty Fire Tower is now not permitted to contact Adelaide Fire to advise of smoke sightings - they now must call 000!!! Too bad if 000 is jammed up again. Might as well close the tower down if it cannot function effectively and quickly.

Thats not a very big crunch if an old and out dated fire spotting tower can't contact commcen! (The first person to tell me the last fire the Tower spotted first (Inside Clealand notwithstanding) wins a prize!)

I also believe that measure was implemented by SAMFS commcen to help keep their staff sane.

[boredmatrix]

Now the perfect solution would be a commcen that was merely a large floor area, with SAMFS comms, SACFS comms, SES SCC all working from the same databases, yet with their own separate areas so that they all deal with their own service. Yet they would be close enough to be able to communicate without ringing each other or needing liaison officers to drive around town to another building.

not a pipedream - isn't that what SACAD is supposed to do?  if you believe the spin-doctors!!



Dare I suggest a purpose built building, housing SAPol and SAAS comms as well. Then we could have all emergency services working off the same page and would cut out 99% of the crap that goes on

that would have to be one HUGE building!  SAPOL comms is massive, and SAAS comms has just undergone a massive renovation - it now occupies the entire top floor of greenhill rd.

the other issue with them all being housed in the same location is security.....all it takes is one well positioned explosive, and all critical ES infrastructure gone in an instant - would never happen....would it??

[mengcfs]

Hmmmm, surely at least a message of 'siren activation' would suffice. I know they're busy but.....

MFS: INC # 56 - 13/12/07 15:51,RESPOND GRASS FIRE,PINNAROO CFS,PINNAROO, MAP 0 0 0 ,,AT 6 BORE ROAD MURRAYVILLE,SAIR55 PINN19*CFSRES:

MFS: URGMSG (brigade) RESPOND (incident type), (location), (other info.) 13/12/2007 3:52:08 PM

[Robert-Robert34]

if you believe the spin-doctors!!

We might as well employ Shane Warne to be in charge of the SACAD system cause he was known as the spin king/doctor 

[rescue5271]

Adam,that is the new secret coding 

[mack]

Might as well close the tower down if it cannot function effectively and quickly.

Never really functioned well to be honest did it..?

Thats not a very big crunch if an old and out dated fire spotting tower can't contact commcen! (The first person to tell me the last fire the Tower spotted first (Inside Clealand notwithstanding) wins a prize!)

The tower used to be the first report of quite a few incidents.

[CFS_Firey]

The tower used to be the first report of quite a few incidents.

You mean before mobile phones?

[mack]

The tower used to be the first report of quite a few incidents.

You mean before mobile phones?

lol - for all the decent posts from people like yourself, and numbers... there are also some extremely uneducated ones. the fire tower has proven itself year after year, although it can depend on the tower operator (and the cleanliness of the tower windows )

[CFS_Firey]

The tower used to be the first report of quite a few incidents.

You mean before mobile phones?

lol - for all the decent posts from people like yourself, and numbers... there are also some extremely uneducated ones. the fire tower has proven itself year after year, although it can depend on the tower operator (and the cleanliness of the tower windows )

I asked because you said "Used", indicating that it's not the case anymore.... I wondered what changed...

[6739264]

lol - for all the decent posts from people like yourself, and numbers... there are also some extremely uneducated ones. the fire tower has proven itself year after year, although it can depend on the tower operator (and the cleanliness of the tower windows )

The only thing that the fire tower proves year after year is that the proportion of calls that it is helpful for continues to drop.

SOP's for the tower tend to boil down to: listen to GRN 124/monitor pager scanner, when you hear appliances turning out to a job, look in the general direction,...wait..., see smoke, call commcen to confirm that the smoke is in the same location as previous incident and log it in the occurrence book.

Yep, thats some front line fire detection right there.

(Yes there is the odd job inside Cleland that the tower spots first, but thats about it)