Map

SFD's Magic Map

Smoke & flames coming out of a second story window. Five construction workers trapped in a building cave-in. Injured children trapped in their mangled car after a head-on collision on I-5. A drunken man demanding an ambulance. 81-year-old woman having a heart attack. These are a few typical calls received by Seattle Fire Department's dispatchers, the men and women who answer 911 calls and send help to the scene. The dispatchers are all highly trained firefighters, with the skills and intelligence to respond quickly and ... well, quickly when the call of danger comes. Seated at high-tech consoles replete with panels of buttons, blinking lights and computer screens, these watchmen of the public perform tirelessly, diligently, so that you can go to the movies, and leave food cooking on the stove.

This glorious cadre spends their waking hours in a semi-darkened room, waiting for the bozos to call in their little crises. The room is dominated by a huge map of the city, on a glass wall 25 feet high, seperating the dispatchers from computer and communications equipment vital to the functioning of the system. This map contains red and green lights, representing the city's 34 fire stations and the specialized firefighting vehicles available at each station -- ladder trucks, engines, aid cars, medic units, and battalion chiefs.

An interdepartmental team of city technology experts recently custom-built this map, which is updated live by a VAX computer to reflect the current status of all fire department stations. SFD is the only fire department in the country with such a system. And it gets people's attention immediately when they visit the command floor at SFD's alarm center.

"Ya, sure, you betcha," said computer programmer Zbigi Pzyzelski, who wrote the software which interfaces the map to the dispatchers' computer dispatching system.

"It works, mm-hmm," said dispatcher O'Mahoney.
"I look at it all the time," said dispatcher Linker.
"It's large," said Capt. Jacoby.
"Can I leave early today?" said Lt. Cornie.

Another feather in the cap of Seattle Fire Department's use of technology to help in the ongoing fight to save people's lives just a little faster, just a little smarter than those other guys' fire departments.