Method and apparatus for persistent communications, interoperability and situational awareness in the aftermath of a disaster
First Claim
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.
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Abstract
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.
95 Citations
20 Claims
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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:
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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. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12)
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13. A method for establishing situational awareness outside a wireless mesh network at the area of an incident to a location outside of said incident area, comprising:
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detecting one or more communications channels for determining one or more available channels and determining the capacity and reliability of the one or more available channels; switching data from the wireless mesh network to a prioritized connection amongst the one or more available channels based on channel availability, knowledge of the traffic on said wireless mesh network and at least one of communication channel expense, speed, robustness, reliability, bandwidth of the channel, bandwidth requirement of data to be transmitted; and cannibalizing power at the incident area to provide access to alternative power sources to power one or more network modules of the wireless mesh network. - View Dependent Claims (14, 15, 16, 17)
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18. A system for providing situational awareness from an incident area based on communication between interoperable communications modules on a wireless mesh network, comprising:
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a prioritized connection module connected to said wireless mesh network for determining availability of a terrestrially-based communication channel, wherein said prioritized connection module includes a switching system for connecting situational awareness information to available terrestrially-based communication channel 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; the prioritized connection module for switching information from said wireless network to a satellite phone system in the absence of availability of a terrestrially-based communication channel, whereby said satellite phone system is operable to import and export data from and to said wireless mesh network at said incident area to and from a location remote to said incident area, thus to provide situational awareness outside of said incident area; and an automatic power management feature for providing access to a plurality of alternative power sources to power the network modules. - View Dependent Claims (19, 20)
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Specification