Automobile companies are rapidly deploying millions of vehicles with increasingly advanced abilities to detect, collect and wirelessly transmit crisis-related voice and crash data at the push of a button or the deployment of an airbag. Crash data is used to predict the severity and assist in providing emergency responders information, which will lead to proper treatment in the shortest time possible.

THE NEED

The National Mayday Readiness Initiative (NMRI) was a public-private partnership of more than twenty national organizations who met over a span of six months in late 2000 to develop and address the primary issues that arise in the dealings between private Mayday "telematics service providers" (or "TSPs", such as OnStar, ATX Technologies, AAA Response) and the nation's public emergency response agencies. The Initiative was co-sponsored by the United States Department of Transportation and COMCARE, and was supported by DOT funds and a grant from General Motors/OnStar.

COMCARE'S APPROACH

Following a series of meetings, the group made the following recommendations:

1. When citizens dial 9-1-1, or have a crash or push the Mayday button in a telematics-equipped vehicle, they expect appropriate, rapid response. Our top priority is efficient, fast and accurate communications in emergency situations between the public, TSPs and public emergency response agencies.
2. It is critical that private call center operators be trained properly, including familiarity with the operating procedures of the emergency response community and the standards created and adopted in the nation's 9-1-1 centers.
3. All private call centers, 9-1-1 centers and other emergency response agencies at the local, state, and federal level need to be able to communicate easily with one another, for both voice and data. Currently, this is not always the case for voice, and almost never the case with data.
4. Our emergency response agencies are too often operating with outdated technology. Many lack intelligent workstations, high speed data communications links, and access to the Internet. Our response agencies are ending up on the wrong side of a digital divide.
5. TSPs need to describe properly how their Mayday devices work in conjunction with wireless systems and the emergency response community. Ambulances are not "automatically dispatched", and an automatic crash notification cannot occur without a wireless connection from the car.
6. Automobiles are capable of producing increasingly sophisticated crash data, from which emergency medical experts believe the probability of severe crash injuries can be predicted. However, there has not been a process in which the parties can agree on what types of ACN data can be reasonably captured and transferred to PSAPs and other appropriate entities.
7. These disparate parties identified the absence of a national forum for education and issue resolution between them, now and over time as the technologies rapidly change.

FROM VISION TO REALITY

COMCARE is currently formulating a plan to launch NMRI II.

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