Webster Field Staff Aid in National Disasters
U.S. Navy photo by Connie Hempel
Emergency response throughout the country is made far easier with the help of the employees at Webster Field in St. Inigoes, MD., reports Donna Cipolloni in The Tester.
Terrorism, release of explosives, or man-made disasters, in an emergency the National Guard deploys a team supported by trucks called a Unified Command Suite (UCS). All of those trucks are outfitted, updated, and serviced at Webster.
The trucks were used during hurricanes Katrina and Sandy, the Boston Marathon bombing, the Super Bowl, and national political conventions as stand-alone communications platforms.
Nick Creswell, systems manager with Webster’s Special Communications Requirements Division, described the UCS vehicle to the Tester as a self-contained, stand-alone mobile communications platform that can provide on-site voice, video, and data communications capabilities.
“It arrives and sets up a satellite reachback and acts as a central hub for all communications for the Civil Support Team and other government authorities,” says Mr. Creswell.
“UCS equipment provides the on-site capability to tie different radio networks together to facilitate the flow between different organizations and agencies, and it can also provide secure and non-secure network access for FBI agents or local first responders to get out on the Internet and do what they need to do.”
