Emergency responders are introducing a new artificial intelligence-powered tool to enhance safety and response times during major events as downtown Baltimore gets ready to host one of the city’s largest events of the year.
During this weekend’s Artscape festival, which is anticipated to attract hundreds of thousands of visitors, the system will be formally launched by Baltimore’s 911 Call and Dispatch Center.
The technology, according to officials, has been in development for over a year and is intended to provide more accurate, quicker, and more intelligent emergency responses.
Tenea Reddick, the director of 911 in Baltimore, stated, “This is the kickoff to our busiest season in public safety. This was the one time where we said, ‘Let’s get it done. No better weekend to do it than Artscape.'”
The new system combines real-time call routing, geolocation, and AI
Throughout the event, a group of committed dispatchers from the city’s Emergency Operations Center (EOC) will be able to identify incidents in each of the seven Artscape areas with zone-specific precision.
Calls from the festival can be isolated from the city’s normal call volume using remote call-taking and geofencing technology, which will lessen the burden on the larger 911 system.
“This is the first time a city of our scale, with the call volume we manage, has done something like this,” Wayne Harris, Baltimore’s 911 Operations Manager stated. “We felt Artscape was the perfect time to test the technology.”
In order to help non-native English speakers, Reddick added that the system has real-time language translation capabilities that enable dispatchers to speak Spanish, French, Arabic, and other languages at any time.
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The 911 center in Baltimore receives over 1.4 million calls annually, or roughly 3,500 calls every day. According to officials, this new tool will enable them to separate calls related to events with high traffic while preserving service levels throughout the city.
The system will likely be used at other significant city events, such as AFRAM and winter festivals, after Artscape.
