Bolero wireless intercom and Artist digital matrix intercom products from Riedel are providing an extensive communications backbone for the 2020 NBA Bubble in Orlando, Florida. 

Riedel-4 NBA_Bubble_HP_Operator_Brian_Hurst

Safe: NBA Bubble HP operator Brian Hurst at the communications and audio control position

Located within Walt Disney World, the NBA Bubble is a strict isolation zone created to allow the 2019-2020 basketball season to continue. Firehouse Productions deployed the Riedel systems, which enable officials, coaches, and production personnel to communicate safely during NBA games played in the ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex. The Bubble deployment consists of 12 Riedel Artist intercom nodes, providing almost 500 active communications ports to support 113 master panels; 57 Performer C3 intercom beltpacks; 116 Bolero wireless intercom beltpacks; and 186 analogue 4-wire connections to six onsite OB trucks. Deployed in a fully redundant fibre ring configuration, the Artist nodes are able to support users communicating via Bolero beltpacks throughout the vast complex — including players, coaches, and officials in the green zone, where games are played on three venues, and the yellow zone, encompassing the technical and broadcast compound.

Using Bolero, personnel who can no longer speak directly with each other due to social distancing measures can now communicate clearly and easily. For instance, coaches and officials are able to converse with scorers and other game personnel who are sequestered behind plexiglass shields at courtside. Luis Espinal, intercom curator for the Firehouse team, built custom logic functions into the Artist nodes that allow specific mic feeds to be routed to specific broadcast trucks.