WASHINGTON DC: PUBLIC SAFETY RADIO SYSTEMS ARE DOWN
March 30th, 2010Via: WJLA:
Authorities say all Public Safety Radios are down in the District. All DC emergency responders use the system.
The police and fire radios went out of service around 7:15 p.m. Fire officials say 911 is not affected.
Fire officials say they switched to a back-up system that uses portal radios and borrows channels from Montgomery County and Arlington County within 10 minutes of discovering the problem. Fire officials say they are also using a computer system.
An MPD official says officers are getting calls via computers and phones.
The D.C. mayor’s office released a statement about the outage there were no breaks in emergency services and that “all 911 calls were handled in a timely and professional manner.”
The statement also said that Pepco is helping to restore power to the main radio tower.
The cause of the outage is unknown.
Authorities stress there is no reason for public to be concerned, thanks to the backup system, and that response times haven’t been affected.
DC Fire EMS has also established a communications operations center at Engine 2 located at 6th St & F St NW.
Stay ready NYC.