Excerpts from the Journal-topics.com:
$1.4 million awarded to upgrade communications equipment for 16 north suburban fire departments including Niles, Des Plaines, Glenview, Prospect Heights, Morton Grove, Northbrook, Glencoe, Highland Park, Evanston, and the Deerfield-Bannockburn FPD. Some departments are receiving upgraded radios, but most are receiving a software upgrade to help in locating firefighters in distress.
The new feature in advanced digital radios and software provided in the grant will allow fire scene commanders to ping the location of a missing or unresponsive firefighter, if those firefighters become unaccounted for at a fire scene. Although the pinging feature allows the location of that radio to within 50 feet, if a firefighter is not responding within a multistory building, the feature cannot read what level that radio is on.
