Reach
Issue 7 2014
|
9
ers
Service
demand
Information and Communication
Department, Hampshire FRS.
“Although we are not untypical in
serving rural areas, mobile phone
coverage is not brilliant in much of
the county. And with all the kids
using their smartphones after school
and us being in an industrial area,
the rate of bandwidth available was
often terrible.”
The ICU was fitted with a satellite
antenna to provide an alternative
wireless connection between the ICU
and Fire HQ, and with 3G coming
under increasing strain, the system
was then toggled to use satellite first.
This not only increased the cost of
wireless connectivity, but meant that
in areas such as the New Forest,
line of sight to the satellite could be
obscured by trees, leaving the ICU
with no high-speed wireless data
connectivity at all.
Airwave’s broadband aggregation
solution 4GMax is a cost-effective
service that brings together the
signal strength from multiple mobile
operators. By combining bandwidth
from up to four commercial mobile
networks, 4GMax delivers increased
uplink capacity enabling applications,
such as live video streaming, from
vehicles on the move. It also provides
an effective alternative to satellite
communications or fixed links.
“4GMax has definitely enabled cost
savings in terms of data connectivity,
but this is secondary to the fact
that reliable broadband provides
both us and the public with a safer
environment, which is what we are all
about,” said Paul.
“When we saw that 4GMax
aggregates the bandwidth across
the carriers, we realised that this
would solve a lot of problems for
us. We were also interested in its
compact size and the fact that it
could be powered directly from the
ICU’s battery. Unlike our legacy GSM
modem, 4GMax doesn’t just lock
on to one network and only switch
when the signal fails, but switches
intelligently to the network(s) offering
the best coverage and bandwidth.”
According to Paul, 4GMax was
installed in the ICU within a few
Above: Airwave’s 4GMax in action in the Hampshire
Fire and Rescue Service Incident Command Unit.
