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GCN Home > 09/11/06 issue

A clear message

As a firefighter at Ground Zero, and now with GSA, Michael Pena pushes for better emergency communications

By Caron Golden, Special to GCN

On Sept. 11, 2001, Michael Pena was off duty, but not for long. After news spread of the attacks on the World Trade Center, Pena, one of three lieutenants with the Fire Department of New York City’s Rescue Company 1 in Manhattan, an elite group on the order of the Navy Seals, reported to the scene just as the south tower collapsed.

He formed a team with other firefighters to assist with the rescue of firefighters and civilians trapped in the north tower. During the course of the operation, he and his team had to improvise their way around the city’s communications shortcomings.

Most of the equipment used by on-duty personnel was lost, so his team gathered equipment from undamaged fire trucks and took communications gear, such as walkie-talkies, from colleagues being transported to area hospitals.

“The only communication I had was within the fire department by radio,” he recalled. “We had no communication with other agencies on scene, except face to face.”

He has taken the lessons learned that day with him into the federal realm. Six months after the attacks, Pena, who served with FDNY for 21 years, retired from the department and joined the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s Region 2 operations and planning branch. He was with FEMA for four years—through hurricanes Katrina and Rita—before taking his current job, as regional emergency coordinator for Region 2 (New Jersey, New York and the Caribbean) with the General Services Administration.

Not speaking

His experience with communications issues at the local level has left him sounding frustrated. “The main problem with communications in New York City is not the technology but rather the human factor of the police department and the fire department not wanting to communicate with each other,” he said.

“It did change a little after 9/11, with the integration of radios placed in both police department and fire department supervisor cars to be able to communicate with each other on the command level. This is where the interagency communication needs to be, not on the operational level between firefighters and police officers.”

Pena said that now, with the perspective of a federal responder, he can see that the push, shortly after the attacks, to establish communications interoperability between local and federal agencies was premature.

More news on related topics: Communications / Networks, Homeland Security, Management, IT Management, State & Local



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