Dec 1, 2004 5:21 PM

The Chicago Fire Department currently is field-testing handheld mobile computers that are capable of providing incident commanders with layouts and floor plans of buildings and hazardous materials sites while in route to a scene, the Chicago Sun-Times reported. The paper said the handhelds are valued at $1800 but did not identify the vendor.

A Chicago Firefighters Union official said such information “probably would have made a difference,” in the October 203 high-rise fire in the city’s downtown Loop business district in which six people died, according to the Sun-Times. The victims were found 90 minutes after firefighters arrived on the scene, partly because of confusion concerning the number of stairwells that were in the building and where the victims were located, the paper reported.

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