WFTND Blog Information

An emergency manager trying to make a difference.

The name of the blog comes from a conversation with my daughter, where she told me that I was always looking to help people be prepared for the inevitable emergencies in life.

I started this blog as a place to assemble all the information that I was getting every day and to share my thoughts and ideas on emergency management.

I had no idea how much of the blog would wind up being what's in the news. While it does not take a lot to add a blog entry, I just did not realize how much of my day was involved with simply keeping up with what's going on. All of the posts, whether what's in the news or comments or just a piece of information, have a purpose; to get us thinking, to get us talking, and to make things better - in other words, to make a difference.

Hopefully this blog will save you some time and energy, or help you in some other way. If you would like to see something, please let me know.

Posting an article does not imply that I agree with the comments in the article. In fact, in many case, I do not agree, but feel that the comments should be part of the discussion. All opinions are welcome. I only ask that you remain considerate and professional of other opinions.

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Favorite Quotes for the Emergency Manager

  • “In preparing for battle I have always found that plans are useless, but planning is indispensable.” Dwight D. Eisenhower
  • “Motivation is the art of getting people to do what you want them to do because they want to do it.” Dwight D. Eisenhower
  • “Failing to plan is planning to fail”
  • “Expect the best, plan for the worst, and prepare to be surprised.” Denis Waitley
  • "Station 51, KMG365."
  • “One of the true tests of leadership is the ability to recognize a problem before it becomes an emergency.” Arnold H. Glasgow
  • “An ostrich with its head in the sand is just as blind to opportunity as to disaster”
  • “The powers in charge keep us in a perpetual state of fear keep us in a continuous stampede of patriotic fervor with the cry of grave national emergency. Always there has been some terrible evil to gobble us up if we did not blindly rally behind it by furnishing the exorbitant sums demanded. Yet, in retrospect, these disasters seem never to have happened, seem never to have been quite real.” Douglas MacArthur
  • “My ideas have undergone a process of emergence by emergency. When they are needed badly enough, they are accepted.” Buckminster Fuller
  • “Bad planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part”
  • "If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you, ..." Rudyard Kipling
  • "Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored." Aldous Huxley
Showing posts with label M/A-COM. Show all posts
Showing posts with label M/A-COM. Show all posts

Saturday, January 31, 2009

URGENT COMMUNICATIONS: Spanos out as New York SWN program director

Less than two weeks after the state of New York terminated its $2 billion contract with Tyco Electronics M/A-COM to build and maintain a statewide wireless network (SWN) for public safety, SWN program director Jonathan Spanos no longer is working for the state.

“We have started restructuring the SWN program office, and [Spanos] no longer being with us is a result of that,” said Angela Liotta, spokeswoman for the New York’s office for technology (OFT), who said the state would not comment on the details of personnel matters.

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Sunday, January 25, 2009

YORK DAILY RECORD: Police, fire portable radio batteries swapped

In the fall of 2008, police departments in York County received new batteries and chargers from M/A-COM as part of the new 911 system the county was having installed.

But officers soon discovered what they believed was a major shortcoming with the new Nickel-cadmium batteries -- their charge didn't hold for an entire shift, which for police departments can last as long as 12 hours.

Starting around the end of November, M/A-COM began swapping the 1,200 NiCd batteries with longer-lasting Nickel-metal Hydride batteries.

"We went to Tyco (M/A-COM's parent company) and said, 'Our end-users aren't happy,' so they offered the solution to swap them at no extra cost," said Brian Morrin, York County Office of Emergency Management spokesman.

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Wednesday, January 21, 2009

RCR WIRELESS: New York City rolls ahead with public-safety network plans

The state of New York may have struck out for the time being in building a statewide public-safety communications network, but New York City continues to make progress on a network of its own.
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Thursday, January 15, 2009

GOV TECH/EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT: New York State Cancels Wireless Network Contract

Chalk up another defeat for interoperable communications networks. The New York state Office for Technology (OFT) announced Thursday it has terminated its contract with M/A-COM, the vendor building the statewide wireless public safety network.
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Monday, January 12, 2009

NY TIMES: State Said to Be Close to Dropping Police Radio Project

State officials are close to canceling a $2 billion contract to build a statewide wireless network for emergency agencies after critical tests on the network failed late last year, according to state officials briefed on the results.

Lawyers for the vendor, M/A-COM, a subsidiary of Tyco Electronics, sent the state a letter on Friday threatening to sue if officials follow through on their plan to shut down the project, which was intended to improve radio communications throughout the state, but particularly in remote areas where police agencies have trouble talking to one another.
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