Self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA) manufacturer MSA and Motorola Solutions today announced an integrated Bluetooth solution that is designed to let firefighters communicate more clearly in noisy fireground environments.

Unveiled at the Fire Department Instructor’s Conference (FDIC) conference in Indianapolis, the Bluetooth radio capability will be available to firefighters using the MSA G1 SCBA mask and a Motorola Solutions APX P25 radio—a breakthrough that addresses a long-time problem for fireground communications, according to Dhiren Chauhan, fire and EMS marketing manager for Motorola Solutions.

“On the fireground, one of the main issues we have is noise and how to cut through that noise,” Chauhan said during an interview with IWCE’s Urgent Communications. “When you have the complexity of a self-contained breathing apparatus, you have even more noise that you have to filter through—through that SCBA, you’ve got inhalation, filters and things like that.

“By working with MSA and having them utilize our Bluetooth stack and our APX family of radios allows them to put the microphone immediately into the voice port of the regulator of their SCBA, which allows clear communications and allows them and us to cut through the noise on the fireground, whether that’s a pump panel, a K-12 saw or ambient noise from a fire.”

To enable the Bluetooth personal-area connection between the SCBA mask and the APX radio, the two devices are paired in a manner similar to the pairing of a cell phone and a car stereo or infotainment system, Chauhan said. Once this link is established, a firefighter can follow normal operations without introducing a new potential snag point—a key element of the solution, he said.

“When a firefighter or a first responder is in the heat of that moment, you can’t change the way that they perform, and you can’t change what their muscle memory is,” Chauhan said. “Using Bluetooth allowed us to ensure that, when a firefighter has to have his equipment work, it’s going to work the same way.”

Firefighters have long sought improved radio communications in the noisy fireground environment, which makes traditional analog communications difficult to hear and could wipe out communications using older digital radios. Noise-suppression technologies from Motorola Solutions and other radio manufacturers have improved digital voice communications on the fireground, but many industry observers believed that integrating the microphone into the SCBA—requiring SCBA and radio manufacturers to work together—needed to be part of any long-term solution.

Developments in Bluetooth connectivity have allowed that vision to become reality, Chauhan said.