Thought leadership: preventing collisions in the emergency services sector
Mauro Lantschner, Managing Director at Brigade Electronics in Italy, discusses how Brigade is helping to support the emergency services sector with its vehicles safety and raise awareness of collision prevention in the industry.
What are the main issues for the emergency services sector in relation to road safety?
Collisions with emergency vehicles in Italy are mostly a result of sirens not being directional. This creates confusion for other road users, particularly pedestrians who might struggle to locate where a vehicle is coming from.
The International Road Traffic and Accident Database established that pedestrians and cyclists are most likely to suffer the fatal consequences of a road traffic incident and, based on the data, this is also evident in emergency vehicle collision injuries and fatalities in Italy.
There are lots of challenges for drivers of emergency vehicles. These include travelling at high speeds while weaving through traffic, manoeuvring in tight spaces and operating in dangerous or noisy environments. Adverse weather conditions, high-risk situations and night-time call outs all add to these pressures.
Having witnessed an incident involving a fire truck racing to an emergency first hand and the unfortunate timing of children playing in a direct vicinity of the vehicle, made me more determined to promote awareness of Brigade’s range of directional alarms. It’s partly because of this incident that I am so committed to supporting the emergency services, among other industries we supply, to do their vital work as safely as possible.
Are there any rules or regulations relating to vehicle safety devices for the emergency services sector in Italy?
There are no regional or national regulations for emergency vehicle safety devices. Unfortunately, there are no plans for this to change in the foreseeable future. This means we are working hard to highlight the benefits of fitting safety devices to emergency vehicles across all the relevant services.
How is Brigade helping to improve safety for the emergency services sector?
We have been working on raising awareness of the benefits of our products to the emergency services for many years now. Much of our work is done in person, by organising visits to local operators and supporting body builders with end-user requirements.
Being specialists in commercial vehicle safety devices and located in Italy with Italian speaking staff means we offer many advantages to our customers compared to our competitors, who are mostly generalist and based overseas. This includes being able to regularly visit customers across the country, rather than once or twice a year, as well as providing dedicated support for engineering or aftersales issues.
Our sales in the sector have been growing rapidly as a result and we are now supporting numerous fire brigades and police departments both regionally and nationally.
In your experience, what products are the most important for emergency service vehicles?
We supply a broad range of products to the emergency services sector, including our MDR digital video recorder vehicle CCTV system, ultrasonic obstacle detection range, Backeye®360 and Backsense.
Brigade’s MDR comprises vehicle CCTV and a digital video recorder with 4G connectivity that can be linked to the Cloud. This means vehicles can be live tracked, providing numerous benefits for operators and drivers. This is particularly useful when emergency services, such as the police, have to attend protests and demonstrations.
Currently, any recordings provided by our MDR system are confined to outside the vehicle – mainly for privacy reasons. However, we believe this will change in future as more and more end users become aware of the security benefits for drivers who are involved in collisions or other incidents, particularly when they aren’t at fault.
For further information about Brigade and our range of commercial vehicle safety products, please contact us.
