Company experiments with Google Glass for first responders.

• Position: Homeland Security News

Of the privileged few who received the new Google Glass wearable computer prototype this year, one was MutuaLink, a Wallingford, Conn.-based company that specializes in communication systems for first responders and the military.

Mike Wengrovitz, vice president of innovation at the company, said he was attending a training exercise where police were using the MutuaLink systems and a handheld view screen during a school-shooter scenario. The device worked well, but it was cumbersome.

The real-rime information the police were seeing on the screen was "very valuable, but so are your hands," he said.

When the company learned of Google's "If I Had Glass" program, which offered up the new wearable device to a limited number of users, it applied and received a pair in the mail.

"You need your hands when you are delivering First Aid or putting out a fire, or dealing with a school shooting," he said.

The company spent a couple weeks learning how to use the system and linking it to its Interoperable Response and Preparedness Platform product, which allows any entity to join a communication network through the Internet no matter what kind of device they are...