The move to 5G and the increasing availability of Internet of things (IoT) devices will bring numerous benefits — along with some challenges — to public safety operations as the country moves toward next-generation 911 (NG-911) services, speakers said today at a Telecommunications Industry Association event.

“Creating a strong, nationwide 5G infrastructure will allow public safety answering points and first responders to rely on the Internet of Things to carry out their crucial mission effectively and efficiently,” TIA Chief Executive Officer Wes Johnston said. The deployment of IoT devices will also present “new challenges” for public safety officials, he said, ranging from implementation costs to concerns about interoperability between new and existing technologies.

“In order to fully harness the potential of these emerging technologies, industry experts are going to have to work hand in hand with first responders and government officials to ensure a smooth and seamless integration of next generation technologies into the evolving existing public safety networks,” Mr. Johnston said.

There is “quite a bit of focus” in Congress on IoT issues, Rep. Susan Brooks (R., Ind.) said at the event, adding communications systems need to optimized to ensure the “incredible skills” of the nation’s first responders can be deployed effectively.

“[I]f they can’t communicate and they arrive [at a scene] and can’t find out what the game plan is, then, quite frankly, it’s an incredible waste of resources and it impedes their ability to save lives,” Rep. Brooks said.  “In this incredibly … fast-paced world, it’s just so easy for us to take for granted the fact that we have these technologies, but yet we’ve got to make sure that they work.”

It is important that Congress explore how 5G “can help us save lives and enhance public safety communications,” Ms. Brooks said. She pointed to her state’s implementation of text-to-911 as a sign of how important new technologies can be to enhancing emergency services. Continue reading →

A technology vendor and a locality have urged the FCC to adopt a 911 Z-Axis indoor location accuracy standard that is more precise than one proposed by national wireless carriers.

The comments were filed in PS docket 07-114 in response to an industry proposal for a z-axis, or vertical, standard submitted in August.

In the industry proposal, which was submitted by an FCC-mandated deadline that was set in a 2015 order (TR Daily, Jan. 29, 2015), the carriers recommended a z-axis metric “of +/- 5 meters for 80% of fixes from mobile devices capable of delivering barometric pressure sensor-based altitude estimates” (TR Daily, Aug. 7).

The industry proposal was included in a cover letter to a report on the results of indoor location accuracy testing conducted by a test bed established by CTIA on behalf of the industry. The report recommended additional testing.

Yesterday, as TR Daily reported (TR Daily, Oct. 1), public safety entities filed comments expressing their opposition to the z-axis standard proposed by the carriers and pushing for a more precise metric. In its comments, CTIA said the Commission should not adopt the standard and should instead allow the industry to conduct further testing.

In its comments yesterday, NextNav LLC, one of two vendors whose technology was tested in the test bed established by CTIA, said that “The Stage Z test bed provided the fourth opportunity for NextNav to demonstrate that its Metropolitan Beacon System (‘MBS’) technology provides vertical location accuracy of within 3 meters for at least 80 percent of wireless calls to E911 emergency services. Specifically, the Stage Z Report indicates that NextNav’s MBS technology was accurate within 1.8 meters across all three morphologies tested.” Continue reading →