omnicore Enterprise Dispatch managing comms across Sydney's beaches

Every weekend in summer, Surf Life Saving NSW’s State Operations Centre (SOC) at the SLSNSW Headquarters at Belrose in Northern Sydney is a hive of activity, supporting beach patrols at 129 Surf Life Saving Clubs that manage emergency situations and search and rescue operations across the NSW coastline. With a network of 76,000 volunteers and 26 SOC team members across the state, SLSNSW is tasked with saving lives and delivering community education programs.

The SOC controls and coordinates the State Emergency Response System’s multi-agency responses with other NSW emergency service organisations, including NSW Police, Ambulance, Fire, AusSAR and SES, 365 days a year to provide the most appropriate search and rescue assets to the scene of coastal accidents or emergencies.

Upgrading dispatch: the challenge

The array of radio dispatch consoles at the SOC was reaching capacity limits when it became increasingly hard to manage the volume of communications on the radio network. The SOC was looking to upgrade to a solution that features cloud-based centralised updates of the system, consoles and remote tablets. Furthermore, access to cloud-based recording, channel patching and the ability to access analogs, DMR and P25 within the one system were required functionalities.

Business needs: requirements

Surf Life Saving NSW had in recent years migrated to a DMR T2 network and was looking for a dispatch system with the capability to significantly expand channel and operator count beyond its current limits — one that could be hosted in a data centre and centrally managed with a pool of user licences that can be allocated as needed, not per device.

Moreover, the capability to use the radio dispatch system remotely was a key selection criterion. SLSNSW required that the software be installed on COTS hardware, including rugged tablets that are used after hours when emergencies arise outside of the SOC’s business hours for remote operation at regional and local emergency operations centres or onsite with the forward commander. This would also help with coordinating rescue missions not only on the beach but also in an outside-the-flags environment with a multitude of assets, including helicopters, UAVs, drones, jet skis and offshore rescue boats used by emergency response teams.

Futureproof: the solution

Omnitronics partner Control Centre Solutions was entrusted to devise the best solution for Surf Lifesaving NSW’s requirements and recommended an upgrade to omnicore Enterprise Dispatch.

omnicore Enterprise Dispatch was installed at two SLSNSW dispatch locations: the State Operations Centre at the SLSNSW Headquarters at Belrose North of Sydney and SurfCom Sydney Northern Beaches Warringah. In addition, nine portable omnicore Enterprise Dispatch Consoles were deployed on Panasonic 4G ToughPads, giving duty officers on-demand access for 24/7 responses on the go. User login authentication is linked to each operator’s respective organisational Active Directory credentials. An Eventide Nexlog 740 Call Recorder is used for situational purposes to confirm messaging for the operator/supervisor, for internal after-action reviews and lastly for external reasons, such as coronial and legal/evidentiary purposes.

This vital piece of mission-critical technology includes radio dispatch console licences for 12 simultaneous dispatch operators, each using one of 33 console terminals that manage communications on 22 radio channels across the state.

The two dispatch centres and 65 repeaters sites along over 2000 km of Pacific Ocean coastline are connected using an existing DMR T2 Radio over IP Network. 20,000 active volunteer patrol members as well as paid lifeguards at 80 locations along the NSW coastline are tasked with protecting 8.5 million beach-goers annually, including at popular Byron Bay, Manly and Bondi beaches.

The system integrates with the organisation’s existing technologies and allows them to continue using their existing gateways. It is used both in the State Operations Centre and as a mobile dispatch console on fully rugged 4G Panasonic ToughPad tablets, giving the team of lifesavers a range of flexible communications options that help them safeguard the public 24/7/365. Advanced reporting capability allows the operations centre management to access vital reports that help with workload planning and incident forecasting.

“One of the key improvements over our previous system is the centralised server functionality within omnicore Enterprise Dispatch. Where in the past we would have to make updates to each console or tablet individually, this can now easily be done remotely using the web interface, pushing the update out to all consoles in real time,” said Andrew Ugarte, Communications System Manager, SLSNSW. In the very near future, Ugarte plans to embed Omnitronics omniGateP25 CSSI software gateways to enhance interoperability with other agencies. A full transition to the NSW Government’s P25 Public Safety Network (PSN) is expected to be completed in 2025.