FDIC Conference Brings the Heat (Again)

If you weren’t at the FDIC International conference in Indianapolis at the end of April, you missed a great show! The event brought together firefighters, emergency responders, and industry experts from around the world to share their knowledge, experience, and the latest advancements in the field. And it offered Whelen the opportunity to highlight our latest products and technological advancements, including a live demonstration of how our technology works to calm the chaos™ at nighttime emergency scenes in our immersive Core™ Experience. And we were thrilled with the feedback we heard! As one attendee put it, “It was an excellent presentation on what the products actually do. Seeing it with your own eyes is always better than just reading about it.”

Situated in the heart of the action in the main exhibit hall and in the shadows of the beautiful (and big) Rosenbauer fire apparatus, Whelen’s booth was bustling with activity all week. Thousands of attendees explored our product showcase and took turns pushing buttons, turning knobs, playing with sirens and learning about how our products are made and how they work to enhance firefighter safety. Attendees were able to see our newest EZ Scene Lights™, Perimeter Enhancement Lights and Core™ control systems, as well as learn about our new timesaving install feature, STEADY-LOCK™, that allows Whelen’s most popular warning lightheads to be set to Steady automatically, when used with a CenCom Core® system.

We were also excited to hear industry feedback on the newest features that were just released in April on the Whelen Cloud Platform® (WCP®) — Digital Alerts and Responder-to-Responder (R2R®) alerts. Digital Alerts work through WCP® and Whelen’s Vehicle Safety Gateway® to allow responders to send advance-warning digital alerts to motorists notifying them when emergency vehicles are approaching or stopped ahead. R2R Alerts are designed to help prevent collisions between emergency response vehicles while en route to a scene. Both features are made possible through a partnership with Safety Cloud® by HAAS Alert, a cloud-based connected safety platform that enables the sharing of critical information between vehicles, infrastructure, and emergency services. The integration of these two platforms will enhance emergency response times and improve the safety of first responders and the motoring public.

Our team also spoke with firefighters and other industry professionals to learn more about how we can make their work easier and safer, as well as get reactions to seeing our lights and technology in action in our Core Experience. And as we heard, seeing the lights and Core technology in a realistic setting made it clear how Whelen products work to calm the scene™. Jamie Coutts, the host and creator of the podcast Growing Up Fire, said, “When I went through this immersive experience, I gotta tell you, it completely changed my mind. It’s a gamechanger. This is gonna make it safer for us, safer for them (motorists) and safer for the patients we’re working with.”

Overall, the FDIC International conference was an incredible event that brought together some of the best minds in the firefighting and emergency response community. You can read in detail about our newest products and features shared at the conference on our FDIC page HERE. Thanks for a great show and here’s to next year’s conference! We can’t wait!