Emergency Call Handling and Communications Past to Present:
In the early days, your shout for help at a fire station would set bells ringing and small boys running to fetch the Fireman.
By the turn of the century, and with the introduction of the National Telephone System, electric alarm bells were fitted in the homes of each Fireman, these were operated by the flick of a switch at the fire station. These bells continued to be used through the 1940s and 1950s until they were replaced by sirens.
In 1948 your 999 fire call would be intercepted by the local GPO operator who would alert the Brigade and set off the siren at the nearest fire station. One of the first acts of the West Sussex Fire Brigade (WSFB) was to set up a central Fire Control at Worthing.
Once a call had been received the staff of Fire Control could, by means of large scale maps, status boards and telephones, effectively control any incident calling out extra Fireman and appliances when needed.
To enable even closer control to be exercised the Joint Police / Fire Service VHF Radio Scheme was set up. Using the VHF radio located at Worthing Fire Control voice contact was possible with appliances based at Horsham and Chichester. This scheme proved so useful that by 1959 twenty four mobile stations were distributed around the county. During the 1950s direct 999 lines were set up by the GPO so that all fire calls were received by Fire Control.
A series of callout systems for retained stations was set up, this involved Control alerting the nearest full time station which would then callout the nearest retained station using a land line.
In 1964 the callout system was upgraded by the introduction of the Post Office Remote Voice Frequency System 'A', this finally linked up all the county's fire stations to the central Fire Control at Worthing.
The following year the Brigade were given their own VHF frequency and no longer had to share one with the police, also this year Fire Control and Communications moved into the brand new Headquarters building on St Pauls Road (now Northgate).
The year 1976 saw the introduction of the PYE Pocket Phone 70 fire ground radio. Crews could now be in direct communication with each other, or Fire Control, without returning to the fixed radio in the appliance.
By the late 1970s Fire Control was not only outgrowing the office space allocated to it in the HQ building , the callout system was also becoming obsolete. A decision was made to upgrade the 999 callout system and to house it in a new, purpose built Fire Control building on the HQ site.
By 1981 the building was complete and the installation of the new system had begun. The computerised system, designed by International Aeradio limited, had been given the name of Firewatch and it came on line on the weekend of 26th/27th February 1983.
However, by 1991 , due to the almost doubling of 999 calls over the previous eight years the Firewatch system had reached the limits of its capacity. Plans were therefore made to replace this system with a larger, quicker and more efficient one.
After much consultation with the Home Office and suppliers the contact for the new command and control system was placed with Remsdaq. In July 1993 the Remsdaq Resque computer was on line.
In 1995 new pagers were issued to all Retained Fire-fighters and full time officers. This now enabled Fire Control to call out whole crews or individual personnel at any time of the day of night.
Fire Control has now been renamed Command and Mobilising Centre and this operates a four watch continuous shift system to ensure that emergency calls are dealt with 24 hours a day.
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Information Provider Paul Archer
Last Updated Tuesday July 20, 2004 11:58 AM
