Challenge

Floods, wildfires, power outages…they don’t happen on a schedule. When they do happen, response time and coordination is the key to saving lives and minimizing damage.

Dustin Willett is the Emergency Management Director for Pennington County in South Dakota. It is Willett’s job to equip the Emergency Operations Center (EOC) as command-and-control headquarters throughout the response. That includes everything from ham radio gear to RF Ultra High Frequency (800 MHz), all the way to satellite uplinks. With all of the gear in the EOC, one of the tradeoffs is there are limited power outlets, and they have to very carefully manage what’s plugged into the wall.

The technicians and coordinators all bring their devices – work-related, personal, tablets, laptops, phones – and they need USB access to plug-in and charge.

Industrial Rack Mount Charger Solution

Willett knew what he wanted — a rack-mount USB charging station that fit in the existing EOC rack framework.

After an extensive search, he concluded that what he wanted didn’t exist. He was going to have to fabricate something.

“And then by chance I saw a picture of a rack mount USB device from Coolgear. It was just an image, so I had no idea if the specs were right, if the product still existed, and what it cost. Went to the Coolgear site and the specs were absolutely spot on — the wattage rating, ability to charge multiple devices simultaneously – and it’s the right form factor and it’s clearly industrial grade. It was exactly what I needed, better than anything I would have been able to cobble together on my own.”

The product the image was displaying? Coolgear’s 16-Port 360W Industrial Rack Mount USB-C Charger. Coolgear’s CGL-360WUCA8 a rack-mountable charger featuring 8 USB-A ports and 8 USB-C ports to simultaneously charge multiple connected devices.

Industry: Public Safety

Location: Rapid City, SD

About: Pennington County, South Dakota, Emergency Management is the countywide agency for overseeing the planning, response, recovery and mitigation of any and all major
disasters/emergencies that occur within the county.