Tyne and Wear Fire and Rescue Service has announced that it is strengthening its emergency response capabilities through a cloud-hosted Control Room Solution (CRS) from Motorola Solutions (NYSE: MSI). This move will foster digitalisation, streamline workflows and offer the agency the ability to better scale operations in critical situations such as flooding and wildfires, which have increased in frequency in the U.K. in recent years.

“Our objective is to create one of the safest communities in the country,“ said Phil Clark, Area Manager for mobilising and digital transformation at Tyne and Wear Fire and Rescue Service. “We are amongst the fastest responding fire and rescue services in the U.K. for dwelling fires with an average response time of 5 minutes 58 seconds.” 

“We will continue to invest in new technologies and plan to offer other fire and rescue services the opportunity to join our newly created control room solution,” said Area Manager Clark. “In doing so, we’ll be able to seamlessly exchange information during joint operations, increase scalability to accommodate varying demand levels, and foster greater cooperation and faster responses in critical situations. Our relationship with Motorola Solutions will enable us to realise and deliver our operational vision, which will ultimately help to save lives and put Tyne and Wear Fire and Rescue Service at the forefront of Control Room technology in the U.K.”

Every day, more than 1 million people rely on Tyne and Wear Fire and Rescue Service, who operate 17 community fire stations in Northeast England. Their responsibilities across the community include responding to primary and secondary fires, road traffic collisions, civil emergencies, water and structural rescues and delivering fire safety advice to residents and businesses.

The browser-based CRS enables staff to access the control room by securely logging on from any location to set up mobile command posts or provide remote support for incidents. The new platform will integrate Motorola Solutions’ CommandCentral Evidence software for storing and securely handling control room voice recordings, unifying critical communications and data in one platform, while also linking to the appropriate cases.

“Demand on the fire and rescue service has evolved over the years, and emergency services continue to respond to a wide range of complex incidents,” said Fergus Mayne, U.K. and Ireland country manager at Motorola Solutions. “Our cloud-hosted CRS solution benefits Tyne and Wear Fire and Rescue Service with an intuitive and unified response system that integrates all communications into one efficient and resilient work environment.”