911 system will locate cell calls

Computers will tell the dispatcher the latitude and longitude coordinates of the caller.
By ED RUNYAN
VINDICATOR TRUMBULL STAFF
WARREN -- Within about a year, dispatchers at Trumbull County's 911 center receiving wireless emergency calls will be able to identify the caller's location to between 30 and 300 feet.
The dispatchers will be using global positioning system (GPS) equipment that tracks latitude and longitude.
This capability, known as enhanced wireless 911 or Phase II wireless 911, can be critical when someone calls about a vehicle accident on a highway and doesn't know where he is.
If the driver hasn't noticed landmarks that can help the dispatcher send emergency personnel to the right location, the wrong emergency personnel might be sent, and help will be delayed.
Another example cited by Michael Dolhancryk, county 911 director, is when a driver is following a suspected drunken driver and calls to report it. In nine out of 10 cases, an officer cannot locate the suspect quickly enough to arrest him.
There's relatively little time available to find the driver before he disappears from the roads, Dolhancryk said, so it is critical that the location of the cell call be determined as soon as possible.
Dolhancryk said current wireless 911 capabilities -- known as Phase I -- can only locate some wireless calls as being from a certain cell phone tower, which in some cases covers many square miles.
Sometimes, in fact, wireless calls erroneously come to the county 911 center in Howland from locations as far away as central Pennsylvania or Western New York, Dolhancryk said.
What was changed
Late in 2006, the county 911 center took over the responsibility for taking most wireless 911 calls, Dolhancryk said. A few of the calls are also going to other dispatching centers around the county, but the system is still in the testing stages, he said.
Before last year, the Southington post of the Ohio State Highway Patrol took all of the wireless 911 calls, distributing them to the appropriate department.
The current system is an improvement over the old one, Dolhancryk said, because the county dispatching system is better equipped to handle the calls. But stepping up to Phase II will be an even bigger improvement, Dolhancryk said.
Phase II involves the purchase of computers that use GPS technology for each dispatcher. The computers, which will cost around 100,000 at the county 911 center, will tell the dispatcher the latitude and longitude coordinates of the caller. It will also hook up with an electronic map.
But before that step is taken, county commissioners must improve the electronic map. The countywide 911 Review Board recommended last week that the commissioners spend 450,000 to update or "accurize" the map, which should take about six months.
The process for improving the map is to hire a company to drive throughout the county with GPS devices and visually confirm and identify locations and streets, landmarks and addresses and download that information onto an electronic map, Dolhancryk said. Updating the map also identifies new locations, such as new houses that were not built at the time of the last update.
The money for the improved map and the new GPS equipment will come from the 32 cents-per-month charge that wireless phone customers pay on their phone bill as a surcharge. That fee came from a law enacted by the Ohio Legislature.
What's behind this
Dolhancryk said statistics show that with the explosive growth of wireless phones, more than 50 percent of 911 calls now come from the devices. The percentage is a little lower in Trumbull County, Dolhancryk said, but it is still reason enough to improve wireless 911 service as quickly as possible.
Dolhancryk said the ideal situation would be for Trumbull and Mahoning counties to use the same contractor for having the improved mapping done. That would produce an almost seamless transition between the two counties in the heavily populated Youngstown, Liberty and Girard areas on the border.
Although the improved mapping and the enhanced wireless 911 will eventually provide much better service than what is available now, Dolhancryk noted another obstacle will likely continue to hamper efforts to use wireless phones for emergencies: the unpredictability of reception for the devices.
Even with all the highest technology, if the cell phone doesn't get reception, because of the distance to the nearest cell tower or other reception problems, it will be impossible for dispatchers to get the call, he said.
runyan@vindy.com