Police complain of digital radio congestion
On 14 February, a 19-year-old gunman shot and killed 17 people at a rampage at Parkland School in Broward County, Florida.
Audio released from police voice communication recordings reveal frustration on the part of officers responding to the incident. In particular, complaints about congestion on the air.
"I can't transmit for some reason," said one officer.
"Just so you know, we're having trouble transmitting," said another.
"All cities, all radios be advised to keep your traffic to a minimum. With each transmission, it's causing it to crash, it's overloaded right now, per Motorola," said a third.
Officials say the system was working as intended, and that the users were running into a 'throttling' issue as the radio channel(s) became more and more congested.
The full story is reported by National Public Radio, including comments from Bill Schrier, senior adviser to FirstNet and a recent speaker at Comms Connect Melbourne.
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