Emergency Services Telecommunications Authority

ESTA provides the critical link between the Victorian community and the State's emergency services agencies. It provides Victoria's 24-hour emergency call-taking and dispatch services for police, fire, ambulance and VICSES. ESTA answered more than 2.54 million calls for assistance in 2015-16; on average this is a call every 12 seconds or more than 6,900 a day. More than 1.8 million of these calls come via the triple zero emergency call service. During the same period, ESTA dispatched more than 2.1 million events, an average of more than 5800 each day or one every 15 seconds. ESTA also manages the provision of advanced, operational communications for Victoria's emergency services. These operational communications support police, fire, ambulance and VICSES personnel in the field by this year carrying more than 20 million radio calls over the Metropolitan Mobile Radio Service (MMR); supporting 10.04 million data transactions on the Mobile Data Network (MDN); and delivering close to 1.3 million messages to CFA, VICSES and Ambulance Victoria volunteers and staff via the State-wide Emergency Alerting System (EAS). Demand for ESTA's services, in particular for emergency assistance, continues to grow with triple zero calls answered increasing by 8.3 per cent and events dispatched by six per cent during the year. This integration of emergency services communications within ESTA is unique in Australia and rare worldwide. ESTA's staff are deeply committed to the community they serve and are among the most dedicated and highly skilled in their field. Call-taking and dispatch services are delivered from three State Emergency Communications Centres (SECCs) located at Ballarat, East Burwood and Docklands.