Method and apparatus for persistent communications, interoperability and situational awareness in the aftermath of a disaster

摘要

A system for providing situational awareness outside a temporary incident area network includes a prioritized connection module for connecting a mesh network at the incident area to one of a plurality of available communications channels, with the selection based not only on the availability of a communications channel but also on the associated expense, speed, reliability or bandwidth, so that high bandwidth traffic such as video and pictures can be reliably sent from the incident area to a location outside of the incident area. In one embodiment switching to a satellite phone network bypasses problems with terrestrial networks such as cell phone networks and landlines which may be down.

主权项

1. A system for providing situational awareness from the scene of an incident in which interoperable temporary incident area network modules on a wireless mesh network are used to provide communication between the network modules in the incident area and locations outside of incident area, comprising:
a prioritized connection module coupled to said wireless mesh network for connecting information from said wireless mesh network to locations outside of said incident area, said prioritized connection module including a switching system for connecting said information to available communications channels and in which said system is prioritized based on channel availability, bandwidth of the channel, bandwidth requirement of data to be transmitted and knowledge of the traffic on said wireless mesh network; and an automatic power management feature for providing access to a plurality of alternative power sources to power the network modules.