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Trumbull and Mahoning can avoid wireless 911 tragedy that occurred in Atlanta area, directors say
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Rodger Laird, operations manager at the Trumbull County 911 center in Howland, shows Warren councilmen where Warren dispatchers would work if the city agrees to move its police dispatching there.
By Ed Runyan
WARREN
Despite the delay caused by a lawsuit, Trumbull County is fortunate today to have the updated technology that allows its five 911 centers to locate wireless 911 calls to within 10 feet or so in most cases. Mahoning County also has it.
Trumbull County became Phase 2 compliant in April 2013, meaning that the digital mapping of the county and the other equipment in use was sufficiently up-to-date to allow 911 operators to identify the location of wireless callers to within feet rather than miles.
Because all of the counties that surround Trumbull also have that technology, a tragedy such as the one highlighted last week in an NBC News report would be less likely to occur here, said Ernie Cook, chief Trumbull County deputy and county 911 director.
The NBC report was about a woman who called 911 from her cellphone in suburban Atlanta when her car went into a lake. She told the dispatcher the names of the two streets that intersected at the accident location, but the dispatcher could not locate her for 20 minutes because the call went to a cellphone tower in an adjacent county that was not equipped with the most up-to-date technology.
The woman was rescued, but died later.
NBC said 60 percent of wireless 911 calls cannot be located with precision by 911 call takers.
But even in the most remote locations in Trumbull County and in the communities not served by the county 911 center in Howland, wireless 911 calls can be located with precision, Cook said.
In addition to the county center, separate centers are in use to serve Warren; Lordstown and Warren Township; Girard; and Niles. Warren is studying whether to have the county take over Warren’s police dispatching.
For wireless 911 calls in the Girard, Niles and Lordstown-Warren Township areas, a “one-button transfer” is used to switch the call from the county 911 center to the dispatchers in those areas. By coming through the county center first, the digital mapping is deployed so that it’s possible for the dispatchers to identify the phone number and location of the wireless call, Cook said.
The county prevailed in a civil suit in Trumbull County Common Pleas Court pitting it against several other dispatching centers. The case took several years to resolve, causing Trumbull County to be one of the last counties in the state to become Phase 2 compliant.
The problem that resulted in the death in the Atlanta area isn’t likely to occur in Trumbull or Mahoning counties because each surrounding county, including Mercer in Pennsylvania, has the necessary technology.
It’s not uncommon for wireless calls in Trumbull County to go to a cellphone tower in an adjacent county. Technology in use allows the call to be identified and re-routed to the proper dispatching center, Cook said.
There are limitations in the system that have to do with the wireless carrier and phone each user has.
Of the county’s 911 calls, 75 percent come from wireless phones, Cook said.
Of the wireless calls, many don’t arrive at the county 911 center with a “physical location.” Instead, the 911 center is notified that the location is one of three sides of a given cellphone tower.
In those cases, the 911 center can “rebid” the call to acquire the location. In some cases, the 911 center must “ping” the number to acquire the location.
“Different phones may take longer or not at all,” Cook said. In “almost every circumstance,” the 911 center can find a wireless 911 call, Cook said. Same for Mahoning County, said Maggi McGee, Mahoning County 911 director.
People in the 911 industry have pushed for national standards for cellphones — to require all phones to possess up-to-date technology to locating wireless 911 calls.
But the phone companies are “dragging their feet” on supporting such changes, Cook said.
Mahoning County has actually gone one step beyond Trumbull County in terms of technology, called Next Gen, but features such as video and cellphone messages are not functional yet on the system because many of the wireless carriers and phones have not “caught up,” McGee said.
The counties that are not up-to-date enough across the United States to pinpoint wireless 911 calls are typically smaller ones that don’t have the money to purchase the enhanced technology.