Interesting - carriers need to ..track callers to within 50 meters horizontally and 3 meters vertically
This poses a problem in dense urban areas with high-rise buildings. The private sector companies mentioned in the article who "zipping ahead" of carriers can provide an altitude using things like wifi tracking, but that still needs to be cross-referenced to an actual floor number. (Keep in mind some buildings don't have a 13th floor, etc.) Barometers in phones don't work well indoors either...
So, this may be a case where an FCC regulation is next to impossible to meet, unless someone can figure out how to map altitudes to actual building floor numbers at scale. Seems like that would be pretty labor intensive effort...
Where does the FCC regulation say you need to map it to a specific floor? The carrier just has to say where the person is, not how to get to them. They don't have to provide navigation directions to the EMS crew do they? Seems to me like just giving an elevation and coordinates would be compliant.
They need to be accurate within 3 meters vertically, and telling a first responder that a call came in from an area say 1000ft above sea level would not be that helpful to him/her when standing in front of a 45 storey building, wondering which floor they should go to.
So, it would seem knowing the floor number would be super helpful (though maybe not a regulatory requirement as you say.)
This poses a problem in dense urban areas with high-rise buildings. The private sector companies mentioned in the article who "zipping ahead" of carriers can provide an altitude using things like wifi tracking, but that still needs to be cross-referenced to an actual floor number. (Keep in mind some buildings don't have a 13th floor, etc.) Barometers in phones don't work well indoors either...
So, this may be a case where an FCC regulation is next to impossible to meet, unless someone can figure out how to map altitudes to actual building floor numbers at scale. Seems like that would be pretty labor intensive effort...