Emergency communications systems (ECS) encompass a wide variety of technologies, configurations and applications — and their usage can be surprisingly linked to the coronavirus pandemic.
Some ECS systems are intercom-based and may or may not be similar to the traditional blue-light towers often seen on campuses and in parking garages. Others are an outgrowth of fire alarm panels, originally designed to provide mass notification of life-safety emergencies. Still others are designed expressly for all types of emergency alerting using the most modern forms of communication available, including texting, digital signage, and social media. What they all have in common, however, is their ability to alert large masses of people as well as smaller, select groups to deliver messages of an emergency or non-emergency nature.