TELECOMMUNICATORS WEEK

National Public Safety Telecommunicators Week

April 14 - 20

What is a Telecommunicator? Telecommunicator is essentially the technical term for the people who receive the 9-1-1 calls from the community. Also referred to as dispatchers, they decipher the information received and begin to formulate decisions on how to react such as what type of apparatus needs to be dispatched, how many personnel, type of personnel, other resources, etc. They then initiate the call and carry through.

At St. Tammany Fire Protection District No 11, our telecommunicators are referred to via radio communications as "fire alarm". These men and woman are stationed in St. Tammany Fire Protection District No. 1 (Slidell) at their central station in Old Town. When they receive a 9-1-1 call either directly or through other agencies, they react quickly to the information given and dispatch us to the emergency.

The telecommunicators are literally there from beginning to end of every call, updating information, logging information, making notifications to others or other agencies, keeping track of what we are doing all the while they may be working several other calls at the same time.

We at St. Tammany Fire Protection District No. 11 would like to say a huge thank you and job well done to the men and woman that do this for us. We recognize the hard work and dedication it takes and to be quite frank, on our end, we can sometimes make their jobs a nightmare. They've always pulled through for us.

Thank You!