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The North American Center for
Emergency Communications, Inc. (NACEC)
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NACEC participates in March 2011 Disaster Summit in Orlando
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NACEC
P.O. Box 174
Aurora MN 55705 USA

Phone: 218.305.4100

NACEC History
The story of this organization is an interesting and very enjoyable one. It all started with The Desert Voices Project (1990-1991). Desert Voices was a military family support project from which the concept of NACEC was derived. You can read the Desert Voices Project Story, look at Construction Photos, see some Volunteer Radio Operator Photos and view some of the Post Cards Received From Military Radio Operators in the Middle East. The Desert Voices Project was successfully completed in 1991.

Later in 1991, Mr. Addy, The Desert Voices Projects founder and chief architect, was asked by the Salvation Army to attend a disaster conference at their Chicago facilities covering their Hurricane Andrew operations. A large part of the conference was spent covering the logistical communications problems they encountered caused by the failure of the communications and electrical infrastructure within the disaster area. The list of damaged or destroyed systems covered almost everything from electricity, telephone, television, cable TV, radio and Television broadcast stations to commercial two-way radio, public service radio communications and even law enforcement two-way radio systems, all damaged or brought down by the hurricane.

Mr. Addy was then asked if he could come up with a logistical communications support system that would allow them to better coordinate their future disaster response and relief activities.

In 1992 he put together the Global Voices Project that would deploy to the disaster area to address these communications issues. It would provide local and long distance two-way radio communications support to disaster relief organizations that were working within the effected area. The organization would be 100% volunteer.

Here are some of our history, past accomplishments and dates of interest:

1993 The Global Voices Project assisted The Salvation Army with communications in Des Moines Iowa with the Flood-of-the-Century.
1994 The Global Voices Project name was changed to The North American Center for Emergency Communications Inc. (NACEC), to more closely describe the organizations mission.
1994 NACEC received its 501(c)(3) non-profit status from the IRS.
1994 NACEC provided radio voice and message radio communications between U.S. Forces in Haiti and their families back home in the U.S.
1995 NACEC launches very first high-speed military family message service on the new "Information Super Highway", the Internet.
1995 NACEC helps provide 1,000 prepaid 10 minute phone cards to members of the military so they can stay connected with their families during the Christmas Holiday Season.
1995-96 NACEC secures Memorandum of Understanding, working agreement, with the U.S. Army Information Systems Command.
1996 NACEC provides military family communications support for U.S. Forces serving in Bosnia with Operation Joint Endeavor.
1996 NACEC expands its Digi-Gram high-speed military family message service from a 50 word limit to a 250 word limit.
1997 NACEC launches its new Disaster Victim Information Exchange System (DVIS) to help quickly re-unite families. First use was in conjunction with its communications support operations in Fargo North Dakota while supporting The Salvation Army's flood relief operations.
1998 NACEC launches its new military family Flash Mail high-speed message/letter service with a 1000 word limit, replacing its 250 word Digi-Gram service.
2003 Article on NACEC DVIS requested by the publishers of Review Magazine for the U.N. International Aid & Trade Conference held in Geneva, Switzerland.
2010 Following the earthquake in Haiti, on January 25th, The NACEC Board of Directors met and voted to make a series of major changes that would allow the organization to get response teams out faster, and drastically increasing the amounts of communications support that it could provide. These changes are:
  • NACEC will focus on only its primary mission of providing emergency logistical communications support for large scale disaster aid and relief operations.
  • NACEC will increase its scope of operations from providing communications support for U.S. locations only, to providing support for both U.S. and International locations, on a case by case basis.
  • NACEC will use commercial and governmental radio frequencies for its primary disaster response communications.
  • NACEC disaster response teams will consist of a core of paid staff, that are trained professional communications technicians, interns and coordinators, that will be augmented by volunteers. Adding this staff, available for deployment 24/7, will drastically shorten our initial response time and allow us to keep our teams in the field providing emergency communications for months at a time, if necessary.
  • NACEC will acquire and maintain its own commercial radio communications equipment that will be kept ready to deploy, whenever needed.

Since its conception, by providing its communications support to agencies and non-profit organizations, NACEC has directly or indirectly been able to help just under 1 Million disaster victims. Once NACEC becomes fully operational, we hope to be able to increase this number by a factor of 10.



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NACEC is a non-profit 501(c)(3), public service organization.