Telecommunications Service Priority - What's That?

National Security/Emergency Preparedness "NS/EP telecommunication services are services used to maintain a state of readiness or to respond to and manage any event or crisis that causes or could cause injury or harm to the population or damage to or loss of property or that degrades or threatens the NS/EP posture of the United States. "

Additional information on the TSP program can be found at http://tsp.ncs.gov/

The Technical Service Priority (TSP) Program has two components: provisioning and restoration.

• "A provisioning priority is obtained to facilitate priority installation of new telecommunications services. Provisioning on a priority basis becomes necessary when a service user has an urgent requirement for a new NS/EP service that must be installed immediately (e.g., an emergency) or by a specific due date (e.g., essential) that can be met only by a shorter than standard service vendor provisioning timeframe."

• "A restoration priority is assigned to new or existing telecommunications services to ensure restoration before non-TSP services. Priority restoration should be assigned to a new service when interruptions may have a serious, adverse effect on the supported NS/EP function. TSP restoration priorities must be requested and assigned before a service outage occurs."

Is it about trust?

In an earlier posting, I mentioned that we spent some time together in the crew's quarters at Central 911. Some good conversation, a game of ping pong, and some darts. I challenged the folks to stand in front of the dart board as I threw the darts at the board. It was quite surprising after all the time I spend here, that they did not trust their medics to care for them. It did not even cross my mind they did not trust me.

Joking aside, in reality, this is not about trust, it is family. I believe these professionals, in any emergency or disaster can definitely answer the question, "Who is the most important person".

1. Me/yourself.


2. Your family.


3. Your team.


4. The victim.

If you are not there, who will respond? If you worry about your family, can you be at your best? If your buddy/team member gets hurt, does that not take away from another rescue team, with less focus on the victims?

This is not saying victims are low priority, it is just we need to take care of ourselves and our needs in order to take care of others.

Now doesn't this seem to contradict it's about the team. The folks here have the utmost trust in their team, but in reality, as with the darts, with such a strong team, you look out for each other, including yourself.

So, when you put yourself and your own interests first, you only see part of the picture. Ask yourself, are you forgetting about the team? What's your role on the team? It's not only about you!