NYC Dispatchers Recall 2010 Blizzard

The New York City dispatchers who worked the Blizzard of 2010 this past week say it was the worst backlog of emergency incidents since the September 11th terrorist attacks, and that 1,500 high-priority incidents were waiting for dispatch at one point. Many dispatchers could not get to work because public transit was at a standstill, and working dispatchers were ordered to stay until a replacement arrived. As a result, some dispatchers say they worked 24 hours straight. Residents have told reporters that some people died while waiting hours for an ambulance to arrive—many EMS units were snowbound with their crews and couldn’t respond at all. Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who was upbeat about city operations during the week, now says is is “extremely dissatisfied” with the emergency response system. He’s assigned emergency communications director Glen “Skip” Funk to review how incidents were received, logged and dispatched. Funk is a former Navy officer who was hired in 1997 by Chicago to improve its then-new and problem-riddled 911 center. He left in 1999 and landed in the private sector, including Northup Grumman and M/A-COM, until Bloomberg hired him earlier this year to revitalize an on-going program to upgrade New York City’s emergency communications. Read more about the snowstorm aftermath here.