The Rio Grande region of Texas is known for its harsh geographical area – from high mountainous terrains to vast deserts. Such geographical diversity has made the Rio Grande a hotspot for migrants trying to enter the United States, as well as creating difficulties for emergency personnel responding to 911 calls. Carbyne
Unique problems require unique solutions, and the traditional 911 call center technology was no longer meeting the needs of the Rio Grande area.
While new technological advancements allow for Face Timing, car service tracking, and simple text messaging, the traditional 911 call center does not allow for the inclusion of any of these basic technologies.
Next-generation 911 capabilities bring 911 call centers into the 21st century. New 911 systems such as Carbyne’s APEX provide 911 call centers with the ability to view live video and images from the caller while enabling silent instant messaging, text to 9-1-1, IoT data aggregation, and transcription. Further, it delivers caller location with pinpoint accuracy for emergency and non-emergency calls – on one screen – together with a very powerful rich-data recording platform and analytics capabilities, all in a cloud-native solution. This allows 911 call centers to stay online in the middle of natural disasters and allows for 911 operations to continue, regardless of the availability of the physical PSAP location.
Looking to answer the growing challenges to provide aid to 911 callers in the Rio Grande area, five rural PSAPs locations in Texas – including Brewster, Culberson, Hudspeth, Presidio, and the City of Alpine – upgraded their 911 call centers to Carbyne’s APEX system to provide their residents with advanced lifesaving capabilities in their call centers and first responders with full situational awareness of an incident even before they arrive at the scene. As such, emergency personnel can be better prepared upon arrival and have the resources readily available to save lives.
This union between the Rio Grande Council of Governments and Carbyne, beginning in these extremely desert-heavy counties and mountainous terrain, means that first responders in remote areas can remedy a critical pain-point that has limited their capabilities for years – essentially trying to dispatch a team with inadequate situational awareness.
Many of the communities that the Rio Grande Council of Governments serves, face challenges related to population decline, workforce and economic development and especially emergency communications. With Carbyne’s APEX, these communities can now execute a larger more capable call center, improve their call handling metrics significantly and respond quickly to any emergency – from everyday incidents to natural disasters.
Emergency call centers are at the heart of saving lives. Whether calling 911 due to a woman going into labor or a coworker requiring the Heimlich to a shooting, building collapse, or natural disaster, they are our first line to provide the help and resources to save lives. By enabling these call centers with the best technology available, first responders can properly provide the help and resources necessary to save lives. In an industry where every second counts – where thirty seconds can be the difference between life and death – providing an accurate picture of the situation results in more lives saved. Especially in rural areas, where hospitals require extra travel and emergency services such as police, fire, and ambulance services take longer to arrive, having full situational awareness of an incident is essential to come prepared with the right resources to save lives. It’s time for all 911 centers to enhance their public safety technologies as it’s often the difference between life and death.
