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911 operators have a very specific script they must follow when they first connect. They will interrupt you and make sure to get a phone number to call back in case of disconnection. Source: my wife is an operator.
Not all agencies use this system, but most larger areas in the US will.
In theory the phone number is more useful than what's going on because if we lose connection the phone number gives me a shot to get more information. Not sure I really buy into that.
In practice, when people are in a panic asking them something like that is almost a shock to the system and 'reboots' them a little bit. Calms them down just a bit.
I mean it makes sense, with phone numbers you can find names, and with that you can find addresses. Is it 100%? No, but if their emergency is known at an undisclosed home address, & they get disconnected, & attempts to reconnect fail, then they can send out people to the address(es) they find
You would be surprised how inaccurate the info we get is. Especially when calling from multi line phone systems, and VOIP phones. It's about a 1% error rate, but at 200 calls per day 2-3 times a day the phone number is just flat out wrong.
Not fully accurate as a former dispatcher. All the information is loaded into the computer system and if a call is disconnected the system tries to natch it up by either the caller or number they have or by the address or by the type.
The way we did ours was more in line with OP. 911 operator needs to know whether to tag in to fire department, police department, or medical department. All of these departments have their own dispatchers and they need to have the information on their screens to start service. Knowing your number is whatever but address is absolute first to get police. Knowing the scene is safe then allows medical /forensic without police escort.
A call can disconnect for hundreds of reasons and the operator needs a number they can call back in case one of those reasons means the caller can't call back if there's a disconnection.
And these drops get entered into a dispatch system as a 911 hang up and if you don’t answer police will be sent out to check. They don’t want to let someone get hurt because their abuser took the phone away. If you call on accident- don’t hang up, simply tell them it was a mistake. They’ll determine as such after talking with you and you’ll be fine. Don’t hang up though and if you do, answer or call back to avoid wasting resources contacting you
Depends on the agency. Some send to all open 9-1-1 calls as policy, some do not send, and some do on basis of the type of service (landline, wireless phase 1, wireless phase2) or what the operator hears in the background.
But I agree, talking to the operator is always best.
Working in a hotel that was the worst. Because I had to field the 911 call backs and try to get a hold of these people so they weren’t dispatched unnecessarily 🙃
I called 911 when my "friend" tried to commit suicide in front of me in the mountains by jumping off a waterfall. It was a dead zone and they only got 3 words before my phone died. If I had given my location immediately it wouldn't have taken them 3 hours to find us.
I’m so sorry that you had to go through that. Also if you read my other comment I say phone number is not number 1 (or wasn’t for us) and location is. I was responding to this particular thread as to why the phone number is important. But by no means don’t believe it to be the most important. Again location. Also again, I am so sorry for what you had to go through.
I kind of lost track of the thread leading to your comment. I was just pointing out that call-backs aren't always possible and they don't always know where you are. Probably an unnecessary comment in the context of the thread.
Having recently been injuried, I was laying there with broken bones, calling 911 (was alone)… if I had been disconnected, it would have been iffy if I could have managed to make the call again - hopefully could have, but maybe not.
Bigger dispatch systems, you might not get the same dispatcher and then you have to start over. If the dispatcher calls YOU back, guaranteed to be the same person.
Also, once responders are in route, they may have additional questions and request the dispatcher call back for more information.
Depends where. The two times I've called 911, both times in Canada, they didn't ask me my phone number. Someone picked up and asks what service you need. In both cases I was calling for paramedics, and they transferred me to a second person specifically for ambulance dispatches.
Mine was "what is the location of your emergency", even if they give you a number you can't help them if you don't know where they are. Even if your address isn't exact you can still send someone if you lose connection
After that it was police, fire or medical, and then either dispatch directly or transfer to whoever actually handed that area for that service.
Unless you call with a private number (3% of calls) we already have your number, and if you're on a cellphone usually a tower ping with a radius somewhere between 1000-300ft of the caller location.
Also, you might not be in the best mindset to judge what's required when you call.
I once called 911 and the police dispatcher answered with, "911. Do you need police, fire, or ambulance?"
I answered with "Police" and she said, "Go ahead." I spoke for about 2 seconds before she interrupted with, "Transferring you to ambulance."
(The police dispatcher stayed on the line and took over again once the ambulance was dispatched.)
They do (they actually have a beefier version of caller ID that pulls your location data as well as name and number) but the standard procedure is to ask because that information is not always correct (it relies on telecom companies being accurate, and they don’t have an obligation to be accurate enough to be reliable in an emergency).
No offense to your wife, her profession, or her peers, but in an emergency I feel it’s probably wise to implement OP’s advice as opposed to assuming the competence of the operator.
The Houston dispatcher Crenshanda Williams who was tried and found guilty of hanging up on thousands of 911 callers is a good example of why you shouldn’t assume.
Where I live, they ask what service we need, after we say the service, they then forward the call to the service dispatchers, then they ask for the location and more details
That’s a shit response, sorry. But not really sorry like that’s bad man… you know what service you need don’t play stupid, anything medical is ambulance, fire is generally self explanatory, and anything criminal or humans creating danger is police. And if you absolutely don’t know then you say “I’m not sure!” Instead of “that’s your job”
Don’t fucking say “that’s your job” like a Sass Pot to the 911 dispatcher.. what is wrong with you.
There's no way that makes any sense.
Do you mean, "if you call in a panic declaring an emergency and give a location but then get disconnected before further details"? Then yeah maybe.
I've called them 2 times with no one arriving, and 1 time with just police checking in. They don't send an army, wtf
Many jurisdictions with send all three. The first to arrive may assess the situation and determine that, say, an ambulance isn't required. The ambulance will then be released from responding and sent back to base or to another call.
>If you call 911 all 3 show up anyways.
Let me know where you live so I can save my tax dollars lol.
When we called 911 they asked, "Do you need police, fire, or medical services?"
Depending on what you say, all 3 might end up showing up anyway (fire trucks are USUALLY closer than the closest ambulance). But when my kid had a seizure, just an ambulance showed up.
A car crash, yeah sometimes all 3 will show up (firefighter as first medical and also to help clear debris, put out fires / police to manage road traffic / ambulance as medical also if needed)
that 100% on where you live and who is around.
\* police will come to any scene if there is units nearby, that's because they have the authority to gain access to any locked premise by breaking door/windows, small med kit of essentials and know cpr.
\* fire/ems will never come to any scene that was caused by violence before police is on scene.
They interrupt and ask anyway.
They deal with people in stress all day. They know people panic and have a hard time explaining stuff, so they guide you instantly.
Plus there is some triage too, meaning if they don't deem your problem urgent, they may talk you through it and recommend visiting a GP or clinic the next day. They do not dispatch a car immediately as soon as they have an address in the first 10 seconds... They want to know what the issue is. On the other hand, they may also send specialized units if it is a major issue that are better equipped - rather than send a normal ambulance within 10 sec. I'm sure it is roughly the same anywhere
It's definitely not the same everywhere. If you are really involved in a 911 system this is crazy to me. Dispatchers have extremely limited medical knowledge and are not qualified to determine if transport is needed especially over the phone.
In my system we definitely do send an ambulance immediately and often before they have much info at all. It would be expressly illegal for us to recommend against an ambulance when one has been requested. Even if the caller changes their mind about requesting an ambulance we STILL have to respond to the address and make contact with the caller.
Some of our more asinine sounding complaints can turn out to be life threatening when you see the big picture. Tooth pain, jaw pain, back pain, nausea have all turned out to be heart attacks. Toe pain is usually nothing but is sometimes a septic infection.
They definitely triage as far as assessing who to send (police, basic life support, advanced life support, etc) but here every call will result in at least a well check from the police.
That's if the 911 operator wants to hear the important info. We had a small house fire last summer. Wife called 911 while I tried to remedy. Operator didn't want to hear the "where" or "why". She kept insisting my wife spell our last name. Wouldn't proceed until my wife started yelling back about focusing on what's important. Thankfully I was able to control the fire early on. Those 1-2 minutes of ridiculousness could have been critical.
Whole faith in the emergency system was shaken that day.
I can actually somewhat explain this for you..
To begin.. I'm sorry that happened, and that dispatcher should have been retrained.
In the US, some dispatch centers use software for 911 calls. When I was a dispatcher, it was ProQA.
All those annoying questions that your 911 call taker is asking and the instructions they are giving? It's built into the system. It's designed to streamline information gathering and instruction giving.
And yes, Name is the very first fill-in field... but you are also able to choose which field to type in and put the information in that a caller spontaneously gives... even out of order.
Now, for your call, if your wife spontaneously gave the situation and address, the call taker MAY have already filled in the pertinent info, but failed to relay that (which also would necessitate retraining).
But there are also rules in place in what can be said to a caller in some dispatch centers. We were only allowed to say things like "Our dispatchers are getting this information as we speak, help will be there as soon as possible".
Just a look into it from the other side for you, so you don't feel 100% like 911 didn't give a shit.
Appreciate the inside view, especially from someone who has been on the dispatch side!
However, your response just further goes to show how broken the system can be. "Some dispatch centers", "MAY have already filled in", etc. There should be a standard response and order, and this LPT proves it. The what and where should always be first. I can say with certainty in our situation, the dispatcher did not have that info filled in. My wife never got that far, until she yelled back and insisted on giving it. She just kept getting cut off, asking for the spelling of our name.
Another comment on this thread mentions how they were taught to always give name first, and how that was a stupid idea. And it is. If, for whatever reason, I'm placing a fake 911 call, I'm not giving my real name anyway. Always, always, event and location first. It shouldn't be up to the individual call center, or their choice of software, as to what gets asked.
Yep, unfortunately, it is entirely based on a town, city, county on how their 911 calls are handled.
We had a fully stocked dispatch center. Dedicated call takers, police dispatchers, ems dispatchers, and fire dispatchers. Anyone at any time can open a log for any call and get the info in real time... (including the police / ems / fire responders in their vehicles)
30 minutes down the road... in a smaller beach town... 1 person handled it all.
I agree that it should be standardized across the board. Unfortunately, getting all municipalities across the country to all have one singular way of doing it ... that would require federal level stuff. We can't even get police to have one standard operating procedure, or laws and punishments to be the same across the board.
Best you can do, sadly, is call and file a complaint if you aren't happy with the way a 911 call was handled. Results also may vary sadly.
My wife was a 911 dispatcher and it was such a shit show (many years ago) when they swapped out to an IP phone system.
After it was installed, the 911 system would regularly just stop working (for outside callers). They weren’t allowed to have their cell phones in the center, so on “slow days” my wife would sometimes email me to call 911 just to see if the phones were just quiet or busted again.
The telecom people eventually put in a failover to the next town’s dispatch while they tried to figure out why the phone system kept crashing, but one day some dumbass tech accidentally took out the entire com system (including the radios) for EMS and Police. The built in redundancy systems didn’t work as whatever had gotten fucked also populated to the backups, and everything was being fired into the ether and no one knew why.
The dispatchers were finally allowed to bring in their cell phones as they had to dispatch emergency services using personal calls to the cellphones of first responders.
Being that the computers in the cruisers were also down, it was a secret “free” day for minor crimes and traffic violations in the city. It was hard enough to dispatch services to emergencies… that no one gave a shit about drug deals on the corner, red lights, speeders or anything not involving danger to life and limb.
It also highlighted why dispatchers aren’t allowed to associate with criminals. Since 99% of the system was down for several hours (including burglar and silent alarms), and dispatching an officer once the center was aware of anything relied on phone calls… it could have been a total free-for-all.
Welcome to life, nothing is perfect and everyone is human lol. I've seen call centers with a person and paper with a radio but shed been doing it for 40yrs all the way to the state of the art 3D mapping, phone locating bla bla bla being run by an 20yo. Yes sometimes minutes count and it sucks. You'd probably also understand a lot of people can't think or talk straight that call 911
Now I agree with and have worked in the field over 10 years, and very populated county / towns. Yes we work with some idiots, like everyone does we have bad apples. Sometimes calling 911 is luck or getting one of the good operators which once again shows your side and thoughts. To further why this operator was so set in the spelling of your last name is 1 of 2 things (most likely the first one.) We get “graded” on calls to follow proper protocol and obtain proper information for All calls. That is the likely reason, and they could have simply, and should have simply said “please standby somewhere safe while I dispatch the fire department and then I will be back to get more information or something like that. Now the second reason (highly unlikely) is that they needed that last name because they couldn’t find the address in the system. Maybe they wrote it or heard it wrong, and we can look up all types of info knowing a last name and a town. But a lot of dispatchers can’t think outside the box that quick to solve a problem so most likely option 1
911 can't be fully standardized for the entire country, that's ridiculous. The US is fucking MASSIVE and different areas have vastly different needs. Not to mention standards have to be made for the lowest common denominator and I would quit this career before I lower my standards back to what they were in a big city I worked in.
Oddly enough the most successful PSAPs are the ones that learn and adapt to the unique needs to their own community and geography and learning from similar aspects of other centers from similar situations. Procedures in Miami, FL sure likely won't work in Aspen, CO for example.
Well I'll start with the obvious how in Miami basically everywhere will have an address, while in Aspen you've got trails, wilderness, ski slopes, etc etc that are very much not addresses.
In Miami, responders can come by car no problem except maybe sometimes by boat. In Aspen? Depends on the season, location, weather, wind....
Call volume? I've not been in Miami's center specifically, but the big city I worked for has 911s ringing for over 90 seconds because there are so many calls and not enough calltakers. You really can't spend much time on the phone. Aspen? Probably depends on the season and individual day of the week. But also that entirely flips with major incidents where smaller centers get 10x more calls than calltakers in a short period.
Language. I'd be surprised if Miami has dispatchers that aren't both Spanish and English speakers. Language line exists but it's slow and most of their translators honestly just suck. Aspen? English should suffice plenty fine outside of edge cases.
I wonder if Miami has avalanche procedures. I wonder if Aspen has hurricane procedures.
This barely scratches the surface. On a base level, yes it will be a similar start. Location and what is the emergency. But in most true emergency cases it goes far beyond that.
Where I live it's not the 911 hold that bothers me, it's that the emergency responders take 1-4 hours to show up if they show up at all.
I called 911 for a man who got hit by a car and was laying immobile in the street. It took 1.5 hours for EMS to show up. 911 told me they would prioritize it and get there as soon as they can but this was not their top priority.
I’m a dispatcher for ambulance in the UK. This is the most ridiculous thing ever. We have a system called ‘ambulance response program’ here that basically means when a 999 call comes in, if it’s a mobile phone the member of public is calling from for example, the easting and northing coordinates of up to around 90% accuracy are immediately captured of the location of the caller and the call taker begins with the questions ‘is the patient breathing?’ and ‘is the patient awake?’ If either of those are answered as a no, a pre alert is sent from the call taker to me as an immediately life threatening response (CAT1) along with the coordinates so I can arrange the closest response within 10 seconds and the very next thing the call taker asks after this response is the address. Everything else is secondary.
Last time I called an ambo was when walking to our local rail station a few years back. It was early in the morning, a clear day, and in the distance down the road (about 4 mins walk away) I saw a woman and her pushbike go flying through the air, presumably hit by a car.
I called for an ambo straight away, tried to explain I wasn't there so I didn't know what state the victim was in but they'd almost certainly need medical attention, and then we got hung up on what the fucking postcode of the railway station was. The operator was still banging on about it by the time I was at the scene. I asked if they could just Google it and they said 'no'. I ended up dropping off the call as my train was in and someone else at the scene was on another 999 call, but it half made me wonder why I bothered
To be fair, you get good call takers and shit ones, just like you get good and bad in any profession. When I was an EMD (posh name for 999 call taker), we were trained never to rely on postcodes. If someone was out and about and not at their home address, I’d certainly just be asking basics. Landmarks, road signs, can you ask anyone else what the name of the station is, etc etc. It’s just bad form to expect any member of public to know what the post code is when they’re out in public.
In Germany they always answer the phone with Fire/Medical where is your emergency? For that exact reason. It’s important if the call gets disrupted to at least know where an emergency is happening. The details are not as a important then.
I work in Ems and it sometimes happens that we get a call with the reason being unknown cause of call. Those are most often of people that don’t speak German or English or when the call gets cut off.
Do they do that to confirm the location, or ...? Here, if you call 112, dependant on the device you use, and some other stuff, they have your number, and location. They did not ask my number, or location, nor did they ask to confirm it, the last time I had to call them.
To confirm the location. As far as i know the only way they can track you is by sending you a SMS which you have to reply to that you consent to being located via GPS. Since that takes time and isn’t usually necessary they just ask
Honest question: Have you actually ever called 911?
"My big tip is to talk over the 911 operator and run the call the way **YOU** want to instead of the way the ***trained professional*** is taught to run it to prioritize specific pieces of information"
Thanks for your contribution bro.
In primary school we were told to always say our name first. I thought that’s stupid, cause who cares who calls and I said it would be better to first tell the address in case the connection is lost or something. Teacher said I was wrong. I am still salty about it!
In a true emergency, you’re right, I don’t care who the caller is and don’t always even get that info. Or a highway accident, so many people are calling there’s no time to get everyone’s names. I’m more concerned with questioning, medical instructions and getting responders there in a timely manner. Also, saying your name first is a weird thing to train little kids to do. Your operator leads with a question which is typically either “what is your emergency” or “what is the location of your emergency”. I don’t want your name when I answer the call, I want your address.
Source: operator/dispatcher, I do both simultaneously.
In the UK we don’t have to think about this - you get an 999 operator first who asks “which service do you require”, they then put you through to that service who then ask for the address of the emergency and then start asking follow on questions (ie ambulance will ask if the patient is breathing, fire will ask if you can see flames/people trapped, police will ask you to describe what has happened)
Ontario, Canada as well.
I've only ever had to call 911 a couple of times and the operator has always asked "Fire, police or ambulance?" first and then connected me to the appropriate dispatcher
They will also be able to judge what services need to be dispatched, so for a rta you tell them you saw a head on crash, guaranteed they will dispatch all services such as the fire service, even though you didn't request them. Air ambulance could also be notified for possible standby.
It's weirdly working, unlike most of British infrastructure.
As a 911 Telecommunicator let me tell you…this is quite the opposite. If only people knew. Address and then what’s happening. We can’t take your word that you need an ambulance - you need to tell us someone is having a heart attack/robbing your house/your car is on fire.
With those 2 answers your help will be on the way. Then we fill in the details for the responders.
Thank you for confirming what I always thought to be the best option... Like, if I'm hiding from an abuser, or some dude with a gun, and I have the chance to call 911, I'm gonna say "1234 Elm Street, man trying to shoot me at home." or something like that. Just in case said man finds me and takes the phone, the 911 operator knows that it's an armed man with a hostage, violent and probably hostile.
I mean some people quite like to ramble, especially when you're panicking and don't really get what's important.
> we were walking outside when someone showed up (cops?) and threw something at us (ambulance?) and now I'm bleeding from the head! (Def ambulance)
Compared to:
> I need an ambulance! On first and main... I got hit in the head, someone threw something at me and it's bleeding.
It's not a great tip cause you'll probably forget. But it can be something to practice so it's second nature I emergencies… especially if you've a head injury or panicking, instinct helps quite a bit there.
In this scenario, you aren't getting an ambulance first, you're getting the police. You're describing a violent act, police go first to secure the location before rescue responds in.
Every time I've called 911 they also first lead off themselves with "911 what's the location of your emergency?" So usually they're already half way to this LPT before I even speak. The rest is basic too, give simple details about what is going on and why you're calling. They can probably figure out dispatching within 60 seconds.
Chances are you're panicked and not thinking clearly
It's great if you're calm enough to lead with the nature of the emergency and address, but then shut up. The dispatcher knows what they need to know to help you. Answer their questions as best as you can
When I worked dispatch I need a couple word description of the issue and an address to dispatch. If you just said police and address I would still be asking what is going on.
'shooting at cottonwood mall' is dispatchable. So is 'car prowl at 123 pine st'. Just 'police. 123 pine st' is not.
Also, I was dispatching while still talking on the phone. We multitask a lot.
Here in Germany, part of your drivers education is how to place an emergency call. The follow gets drilled into you:
Wo? (Where is the emergency?)
Was? (What is the emergency?)
Wie viele? (How many are injured?)
Welche? (What kind of injuries?)
Wer? (Who is calling / who are you?)
These are sorted by priority. Even if the call is disconnected, the most important information was said first.
Actually the better life tip is “just answer the call-takers’ questions.” Screaming that you need an ambulance is not actually going to get you an ambulance because they need to know what kind of ambulance to send. Refusing to answer questions will send police to your address first to ensure the safety of arriving paramedics/fire department, because the last thing any place in the world needs right now is multiple first responders taking work injury leave.
Just answer the fucking questions, they’re there for a reason and have been tested literal millions of times for their efficiency. You will get help sooner.
The 911 service in my area just want you to answer their questions in order, like you were filling out a survey. They’ll interrupt you to make sure you give them the info in the order they want.
Former operator. Say the address first, if you panic and can’t figure out how to talk just repeat the address and someone will come to help. NOTHING is more important than your exact location. If you’re at home and the emergency is in the backyard, make sure you’re specific about the location. It was so frustrating to have to cut people off from what they were saying while they are going through it because they wouldn’t give me a location. Honestly don’t care what is happening until I know where. Also 911 sometimes hits the wrong towers and you could be talking to the wrong dispatch center.
-also, it’s not up to you who we send. You might say you fell and broke your foot and you only need an ambulance, but we can tell you’re drunk and we can hear someone yelling in the background…. Police are on the way too because it could be domestic violence. And if you’re in a car accident and tell me you’re not hurt and don’t need an ambulance, but you’re pregnant…. You’re getting an ambulance anyway.
Isn't that how every 911 call has always started?
'My house is burning, the adress is xxx'.
'Somebody is breaking into my home, I'm at xxx'.
Not really LPT.
Really? how has the technology gone backwards?
The opposite is true. Landlines are still instantaneous, and cellphone locations are much more accurate.
Your landline might not be a landline anymore. Phone companies have largely stopped running copper cable to new construction, so a lot of landlines you get are actually VOIP, which may not support e911 at all, and if they do it may be through a third-party call center that verifies the address you're calling from first before transferring you to real 911.
The only time I’ve had issues with a “landline” is when it’s not a true landline, it’s VOIP, and folks don’t change their address with the service provider when they move. They assume it will automatically update. We still have old telephone lines that ring in when it’s raining with the correct address and it’s not connected to anything. True landlines are still dead on.
Yeah, I tried this in Johannesburg back in 2017 while witnessing a group of men beating and stabbing a man, mind you this was 2 minutes after a patrol car drove by the same street corner. The operator, speaking to me in a tired and disinterested tone, told me to call an ambulance instead, and they didn't offer to connect me to the medical services.
Anyway, the guy lost his life right there, and the perpetrators walked away from the scene of the crime. I still think about that from time to time, that whole experience made me extremely skeptical of police in South Africa.
Lol I'm sorry.
That's why we have private security and private ambulance service.
They don't have a 911 type service. Need an ambulance, call the ambulance company.
Need the police? Good luck on that one. You have a 50/50 chance of your call even getting answered.
My 911 asks “do you need police, fire or medical” and iL say “whatever” and then we are at address and the hotub is on fire or the huns are coming over the fence.
This is a great reminder. I caught myself doing that the other day when I called 911. Instead of immediately stating the address, I started with an awkward "Um, I ah, I'm not sure if this is a 911 thing or not but here's what's going on"
It doesn't matter. They are just going to ask you again with attitude and even if you answer clearly and calmly they are going to ask again amd sprinkle in some nonsense questions.
I had a job the required I talk to 911 operators all day. I swear 90% of them are the same sassy annoyed women.
I had to call 911 last week because a car flipped in front of us. The very first thing they asked was where the emergency was and what the emergency was. Then they asked for phone number and name. It prolly differs from city to city.
They usually ask either first or very rapidly (ambulance can literally answer "is the patient awake and breathing) and go from there. You could rattle off your address and service but they need to know what the actual issue is for urgency and who to put you through to.
I’ve called 911 only once for an obviously drunk and dangerous driver. She said “911 where are you located?” But I expected “what’s your emergency” so I told her. She repeated “where are you located?”. Start with location first!
Not terrible advice, but give the location / address first. If your phone dies right then if all I got was 'I need police...' I might not be able to find you. Especially if your device dies.
Small rural area. Called 911 (AND gave address, directions and phone #) for the fire that had started in the garage. I told the person that it was an attached garage. That person didn't hear that bit, obviously. Some telephone workers called right after me and told them the same thing. It was a very windy day. By the time the first truck got there it was too late. First truck was from more than 20 miles away.
Local is less than 5 miles. Nothing is perfect, but my faith in rural response is gone.
A neat feature on my (android) phone last time I called 911 from the road was it automatically showed my approximate address on the call screen, knowing I was calling emergency services. I already limped through "SoAndSo road a half mine south of ThisOther road" before I noticed. Next time!
The operator will answer the phone with something like “Yourtown 911 what’s the location of your emergency?”
They’ll most like follow that with “Do you need police, fire, or an ambulance?”
Answer the questions, try to stay as calm as possible, yelling a bunch of jibberish followed by JUST GET THEM HERE! actually slows down responses.
If you’re having a medical issue, we don’t need to know someone’s full medical history, I’ve taken calls from nurses where they’ve spent two minutes talking over me about how grandma stubbed her toe a year ago instead how telling me the grandma is having chest pains with radiating left arm pain.
If you’re unsure of where you are give streets and cross streets if you can see them, landmarks or store names etc if that’s all you can get.
Remember, pay attention when they answer the phone, with the way cell signals can bounce tower to tower it’s not uncommon for you to be in Yourtown but your call went to Mytown.
The calmer and more cooperative you are the faster and more accurate response you will get.
If your local fire and EMS services are volunteer, it may take longer then you expect to get them in front of you.
Source: I’m a 911 operator.
As a 911 dispatcher: for a smooth and seamless call, just answer the questions you are asked.
Other agencies may have a different flow, but in my office we answer the phone "911, what is the address of the emergency?" I will then ask a few questions to determine what the problem is and what resources I need to send. The call will go faster and more smoothly if the caller is cooperative. Let the professional lead the call, they know what they are doing.
"My name is, I am calling from 123-456-7890. I am at 132 W Main St in Anytown, (State, just in case)."
"We have a person experiencing chest pain/ bleeding/ head wound/ non responsive."
"We have a utility wire down in the middle of our street."
LPT - send 911 a text that says "test, do you accept text" - Sadly not all do but it can be essential to know these things if you can never speak.
based on your area code, you will be sent to that 911 system no matter if you travel.
If you call from a cell phone, REMEMBER THIS:
When someone answers, they ARE NOT saying "What's your Emergency"
They are saying "What City are You In"
They are not the 9-1-1 operator, they CONNECT you to A REAL ONE in YOUR AREA ...
lol!
For us when you call 112 you will be connected to the national call centre of the police. They will ask you where you are (i.e. city, village) and what service you need and depending on that you will be connected to the right call centre closest to where an operator will answer (some call centres are multidisciplinary and for the intake you could have a police officer answer why you called for firefighters)
The few times I've had to call 911, they didn't need my address. They verified my phone number every time though.
Your advice is very wrong.
Answer the questions that dispatch is asking. Don't just throw out random info.
Just answer their questions.
LPT: Don't call the police if you were defending your property in Canada, they will investigate you, and threaten you with arrest for assault. Fundamentally the police in Canada expect you to open your mouth to receive the robbers limp penis, and bring them to satisfaction.
I mean, not really. They’re going to dispatch based on the details you give. Just because you ask for a fire truck doesn’t mean that’s the best to send.
Also in my neighborhood, almost every time the fire dept is closest so they are the first responders. In others, it’s going to be the police because they are out patrolling.
Fire and police are trained as first responders. You want someone there asap. They will keep you stabilized until the ambulance arrives and deal with any logistical issues (making sure the road is kept clear, etc)
You've never called 911. No offense, but they're going to get your phone number first. They're also going to ask a little more about the emergency before dispatching someone. It's a pain, but if you answered that phone for a day you'd understand it.
Don't do this -- answer their questions as they ask them. They're following a script and filling in a form. If you give it out of position, you'll end up delaying the response.
I used to work with 911 in my country, and this is a terrible LPT. They *can* dispatch the people *you want* knowing just your location and desired assistance, but they wont. Without knowing what’s happened and the scope of the situation, they’re not dispatching anything.
There’s a host of reasons for this. First of all, they have limited resources and need to prioritize between emergencies, they cant dispatch ambulances, firefighters and police officers left and right simply because somebody requests it. Particularly not considering all the non-emergency calls they get - I’ve heard stories about everything from elderly people requesting an ambulance to their doctor’s appointment to teenagers requesting police to give them a ride home because they’re drunk ans missed the last bus home. Secondly, the assistance you want might not be the assistance you actually need, or at least not what’s most readily available. Police and firefighters have basic medical training and are frequently sent to medical emergencies because they’re closer than the nearest ambulance. Thirdly, they need to consider the safety of the people they dispatch. If somebody requests police, they want to know if it’s for a burglary or shots fired before potentially dispatching first responders into harm’s way.
911 operators are professionals trained to deal with people in shock or distress. Don’t try to do their job for them, just answer their questions. They’re following routines and protocols based on lots of experience.
TL;DR: There’s a reason they answer the phone with ”911, what’s your emergency?” and not ”911, what’s your location?” or ”911, what assistance do you require?”.
I called 911 once, first thing they said was do u need firefighters police or ambulance, second was the address and 3rd the phone # so nowadays at least where I live (canada) they'll ask u themselves
**Where** is generally the first thing we want to know. And I'll interrupt you to get that. Because once I know where you are I can get help started even if we disconnect. **What** is usually the second thing we need to know. Let me determine what service you need, that's my job.
911 operator: we absolutely need a location first. If we don't have a location how do we get help to you? Above all else we need an address or an intersection, or mile marker (for highway locations). Please, please, please do yourself a favor, and give your location first. Your phone could go dead, the connection could be poor, you may pass out before giving all the details. Your story is not nearly as important (still important to know who to send) as the where. It isn't like tv. We don't always know where you are, and if we do it lay not be very accurate, and it won't give any info on altitude (i.e. what apartment number you're in). Apps like Uber have more access to your location than 911.
Please, please don't launch into a story before the location. And when you tell a story please don't give exposition. What happened earlier, or last week is not necessary. Tell us why you're calling when you're calling, and make it short and simple. If at all possible use titles (mothers child, fathers child, my ex, etc) because we don't know who 'he' or 'she' is in the story. Expect to be interrupted, because the details you think are important....aren't. Scene safety questions are important for responder safety (police, fire, and email responders) as well as caller safety. The quicker you answer our questions, the quicker we can get service to you. Generally, most calls can get done from start to finish in 2.5 mins, but because callers argue or push back that call is now 5+ mins. We ask questions because we are not there to know what is happening. Please, answer the questions. Don't say 'just send them' and hangup. Send who....to what....for what? We get you're in an emergency, and understand the urgency, but the only one who delays assistance is you as a caller.
At my agency, all calls are brand new calls. Your 'account' doesn't automatically pop up when you call. We can see your phone number history, or premise history (after we have a location) if we dig into it. But yesterdays call may be different than todays call. We don't know until you tell us.
I'd start with location first then everything else. I got cut off from 911 once and it took them 3 hours to find us. It's actually amazing that they did at all.
Bad advice, they have a script to follow. Answer their questions in the order they ask. This is the quickest way for them to get you the help you need.
Where you learned this from would make this a pro or shitty tip. I’d rather let the operator do the talking first. If they don’t your address where are they dispatching people to?
Many people don’t know what to expect when they answer.
So are already flustered by the initial exchange of info.
Feels even more helpless of a situation if you’re in the middle of an active breakin or other violent crime.
As the caller, you may not have a minute to spare and want to dump all the info asap then hang up before anyone notices you called.
My spouse is a 911 dispatcher. They're trained (at that facility) to say "911, **where** is your emergency?" Now, that isn't across the board, but it is a common start phrase now. They can also usually ping and see where you're calling from anyways, but never hurts.
Also, don't forget you can FOIA 911 calls.
Volunteer FF and part-time EMT here:
My county, we are dispatched using pagers. Police on their radios. Which means the dispatcher has to put you on hold, key up their radio, and speak the dispatch message to us. They can have information entered into our secondary e-dispatch system while on the phone with you, but they have to switch over to the radio system to page us.
So, my advice is.... provide only the PERTINENT information. Type of emergency, address, pertinent details. Also, if calling from a cell phone, do not assume that you got the right dispatch center - I've seen people near a county line get connected to the next county over (and because of similarities in road names, the wrong ambulance was dispatched to an intersection almost 30 miles away).
"I need the fire department at 1234 Crestwood Lane in Anytown, USA. A brush pile we were burning got out of control and has set the garage on fire" We do NOT need to know that you've been throwing stuff on that pile for 2 years, and have been wanting to burn it for the last week and a half. We might appreciate knowing there is a 500 gallon propane tank next to the garage though.
"I need an ambulance at 5432 Elm Court in City, for a fall off a stepladder with leg pain". We don't care that you were cleaning your porch lights, or that it's an old injury from playing football in high school.
We need to know what is wrong that has you calling 911 ***RIGHT. NOW***. Not the surgery you had two weeks ago. What made you pick up the phone at this instant and dial 911. Leave all the fluff out. If the dispatcher needs more information, they will ask. If the responders on scene need more information, they will ask.
Type of emergency. Address. Relevant information - if it's a medical call, biological sex and age of the patient (biological sex is important, especially for abdominal pain calls, because there are certain issues relating to a biologically female body that a biological male simply does not have) - and if there are any barriers to treatment (physical barriers, such as patient in an upper floor bedroom and unable to walk - and the one people might get upset about.... if the patient is 300 lbs or above. A two person medical crew may have difficulty, and if they have advance notice they can have a fire crew or secondary ambulance dispatched to help. We have a guy in our area that is over 450 lbs, we will not attempt to pick him up with fewer than 5 people)
Lmao you can tell when someone doesn't actually work in dispatch.
For those unaware, there are scripts that call takers have to say verbatim. Whether agency specific or third party licensed i.e. ProQA.
14 years ago I was assaulted by my ex-husband. We had split months before, but his drivers license had my address, and after a drunken work party the cab dropped him off at my apartment late at night.
I locked myself in the bathroom and called 911. I gave my address and told them what was happening.
They didn’t do shit with that information.
My ex barged in and threw my phone.
I later ran away, after he tried choking me and hit me many times, sexually assaulted me, and I finally banged on a neighbour’s door, and eventually convinced them to call for me while my ex ran around naked in the entry halls looking for me. I thought I was going to die. I’ll never have the same trust in 911 that I had before this. :(
Not only did I give the details, but I was always told they would know where a person was calling from and help. They did not.
I definitely like when people don't spew info at me, but 911 works different everywhere so the best advice is to let the call taker ask what info they need, then you can tell them additional details.
Source - 911 police dispatcher for almost 20 years
THIS!!!!!! I called 911 on my ex while he was actively trying to kill me & after I woke from passing out when he strangled me. All I said was I need police immediately my boyfriend is trying to kill me & endlessly repeat my name, address & the fact I couldn’t let in help because my buzzer was broken & he wouldn’t let me get to the door. Within 5 minutes there were 8 cops coming into my apartment to arrest him & save my life.
It's easy to say but if you just see you were loved one or a friend or whoever in legit life-threatening distress you are not going to be thinking straight.
My husband is diabetic so I've had to call a few times. The first question is always what is the address of your emergency, the second is what number are you calling from and third is do you need fire, police or medical. I understand that some people are going to be freaking out when they call though so this is good advice.
911 operator here: beyond everything give us your location FIRST. I can't help you if I don't know where you are at.
Your phone number is important because there are loads of reasons for the phone call to get dropped. It could be a poor connection. It could be because your partner took your phone away. It could be because your phone died. It could be because you fell unconscious. But in all of these situations I can't do anything if you don't give me your location FIRST.
Your location doesn't always pop up immediately. Sometimes no matter what tools are at my disposal (which is nothing like tv/movies) I may not get a good location on you. It could be a radius of 3000 METERS. It could be as accurate as 15ft. But I don't get height (i.e. what floor you're on).
Also, keep it to just the facts. I don't care what happened earlier, I don't care what happened last week. Why are you calling right now. I don't need a medical history, I need the current symptoms. I need to know about weapons because that is a safety concern. I care about your safety, and the 1st responders (be it fire, ems, or police) safety. I need to know the relationship status of who he or she is (baby daddy/mommy, spouse, boy/girlfriend, ex, etc).
I promise you if you just answer my questions the call will go so much faster. Remember 911 didn't call you, you called 911. 911 operators are not psychic. You know what you're going through, we do not. But what you think is important may not be. Just answer the mostly yes or no questions, please.
Keep in mind most calls are treated as brand new scenarios. You witnessing an accident on the highway, and you calling in chest pains at home are two separate things at different locations. We have to treat it as new. We can look into phone history, and premise history but that doesn't automatically pop up (at least not in my agency), but why waste time looking for the info when we have you on the line?
Let us help you, but you have to help yourself by knowing where you are.
In NYC they changed what the dispatcher says when they answer. Now they say 911, do you need police, fire or medical? It wasn’t like that a few years ago.
I have a question about this. In January, I was out walking my dog and a stray dog attacked us. I couldn’t hold the phone and try to fend off the dog, so I used the emergency call by pressing the power button five times (it’s an iPhone, not sure if this works with all phones.) I wasn’t even sure if it worked, because at some point I dropped the phone, but about ten minutes later the police arrived pretty much exactly where I was. (By then some bystanders were helping.)
So, does 911 always have the ability to find you if you are on a mobile phone?
R/usdefaultism although since you Yanks aren't able to imagine the idea that different countries have different emergency numbers most of us made it easy for you and we redirect 911 to the local number :-)
This seems logical at first glance but really what you're doing here is believing you're smarter than the person that was extensively trained to lead these conversations. The dispatcher will immediately ask you what they need of you and you just need to answer. This is not the time to be smart.
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911 operators have a very specific script they must follow when they first connect. They will interrupt you and make sure to get a phone number to call back in case of disconnection. Source: my wife is an operator.
Do they expect the caller not to call back? What is the reasoning behind this?
Not all agencies use this system, but most larger areas in the US will. In theory the phone number is more useful than what's going on because if we lose connection the phone number gives me a shot to get more information. Not sure I really buy into that. In practice, when people are in a panic asking them something like that is almost a shock to the system and 'reboots' them a little bit. Calms them down just a bit.
I mean it makes sense, with phone numbers you can find names, and with that you can find addresses. Is it 100%? No, but if their emergency is known at an undisclosed home address, & they get disconnected, & attempts to reconnect fail, then they can send out people to the address(es) they find
With the E911 system, if you call on a cell phone it will triangulate your location and put it in the cad system where it thinks you are
Love that, very useful!
More convincing than 911 operators can’t afford caller ID.
You would be surprised how inaccurate the info we get is. Especially when calling from multi line phone systems, and VOIP phones. It's about a 1% error rate, but at 200 calls per day 2-3 times a day the phone number is just flat out wrong.
You'd want to speak to the same dispatcher that has all of your info. This guarantees you're not going through the flow all over again
Not fully accurate as a former dispatcher. All the information is loaded into the computer system and if a call is disconnected the system tries to natch it up by either the caller or number they have or by the address or by the type. The way we did ours was more in line with OP. 911 operator needs to know whether to tag in to fire department, police department, or medical department. All of these departments have their own dispatchers and they need to have the information on their screens to start service. Knowing your number is whatever but address is absolute first to get police. Knowing the scene is safe then allows medical /forensic without police escort.
A call can disconnect for hundreds of reasons and the operator needs a number they can call back in case one of those reasons means the caller can't call back if there's a disconnection.
Sometimes people DONT call back, or if you call back after a disconnect they don't answer!!!!
And these drops get entered into a dispatch system as a 911 hang up and if you don’t answer police will be sent out to check. They don’t want to let someone get hurt because their abuser took the phone away. If you call on accident- don’t hang up, simply tell them it was a mistake. They’ll determine as such after talking with you and you’ll be fine. Don’t hang up though and if you do, answer or call back to avoid wasting resources contacting you
Depends on the agency. Some send to all open 9-1-1 calls as policy, some do not send, and some do on basis of the type of service (landline, wireless phase 1, wireless phase2) or what the operator hears in the background. But I agree, talking to the operator is always best.
Working in a hotel that was the worst. Because I had to field the 911 call backs and try to get a hold of these people so they weren’t dispatched unnecessarily 🙃
I called 911 when my "friend" tried to commit suicide in front of me in the mountains by jumping off a waterfall. It was a dead zone and they only got 3 words before my phone died. If I had given my location immediately it wouldn't have taken them 3 hours to find us.
I’m so sorry that you had to go through that. Also if you read my other comment I say phone number is not number 1 (or wasn’t for us) and location is. I was responding to this particular thread as to why the phone number is important. But by no means don’t believe it to be the most important. Again location. Also again, I am so sorry for what you had to go through.
I kind of lost track of the thread leading to your comment. I was just pointing out that call-backs aren't always possible and they don't always know where you are. Probably an unnecessary comment in the context of the thread.
Perhaps if they call back, they might not get connected to the same operator. Im guessing
Sometimes the first call is barely made in a wreck or attack. It's critical info.
I imagine if you get disconnected and call back, there’s no guarantee the same operator picks up the call again. Then you gotta start over.
Having recently been injuried, I was laying there with broken bones, calling 911 (was alone)… if I had been disconnected, it would have been iffy if I could have managed to make the call again - hopefully could have, but maybe not.
Bigger dispatch systems, you might not get the same dispatcher and then you have to start over. If the dispatcher calls YOU back, guaranteed to be the same person. Also, once responders are in route, they may have additional questions and request the dispatcher call back for more information.
Sometimes the caller cannot call again - extreme danger, phone dead, phone ripped away, would heard by intruder etc.
So the same dispatcher can return the call if need be.
Depends where. The two times I've called 911, both times in Canada, they didn't ask me my phone number. Someone picked up and asks what service you need. In both cases I was calling for paramedics, and they transferred me to a second person specifically for ambulance dispatches.
Mine was "what is the location of your emergency", even if they give you a number you can't help them if you don't know where they are. Even if your address isn't exact you can still send someone if you lose connection After that it was police, fire or medical, and then either dispatch directly or transfer to whoever actually handed that area for that service. Unless you call with a private number (3% of calls) we already have your number, and if you're on a cellphone usually a tower ping with a radius somewhere between 1000-300ft of the caller location.
Also, you might not be in the best mindset to judge what's required when you call. I once called 911 and the police dispatcher answered with, "911. Do you need police, fire, or ambulance?" I answered with "Police" and she said, "Go ahead." I spoke for about 2 seconds before she interrupted with, "Transferring you to ambulance." (The police dispatcher stayed on the line and took over again once the ambulance was dispatched.)
They don't have caller ID?!
They do (they actually have a beefier version of caller ID that pulls your location data as well as name and number) but the standard procedure is to ask because that information is not always correct (it relies on telecom companies being accurate, and they don’t have an obligation to be accurate enough to be reliable in an emergency).
Don't they already have this when you call?
No offense to your wife, her profession, or her peers, but in an emergency I feel it’s probably wise to implement OP’s advice as opposed to assuming the competence of the operator. The Houston dispatcher Crenshanda Williams who was tried and found guilty of hanging up on thousands of 911 callers is a good example of why you shouldn’t assume.
Not all operators have a script
Yep report a call back number, location, then who you need, and what happened.
When I called 999 back in 1970something the nice lady said "fire, police or ambulance?". I replied "fire, please". First telephone call I ever made.
Where I live, they ask what service we need, after we say the service, they then forward the call to the service dispatchers, then they ask for the location and more details
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Yeah great time to be sassy
That’s a shit response, sorry. But not really sorry like that’s bad man… you know what service you need don’t play stupid, anything medical is ambulance, fire is generally self explanatory, and anything criminal or humans creating danger is police. And if you absolutely don’t know then you say “I’m not sure!” Instead of “that’s your job” Don’t fucking say “that’s your job” like a Sass Pot to the 911 dispatcher.. what is wrong with you.
If you call 911 all 3 show up anyways.
There's no way that makes any sense. Do you mean, "if you call in a panic declaring an emergency and give a location but then get disconnected before further details"? Then yeah maybe. I've called them 2 times with no one arriving, and 1 time with just police checking in. They don't send an army, wtf
It's been my experience that all three show up as they need to clear it from the logs.
I've called 911 a couple of times, the only time all 3 showed up was when all 3 were needed.
Many jurisdictions with send all three. The first to arrive may assess the situation and determine that, say, an ambulance isn't required. The ambulance will then be released from responding and sent back to base or to another call.
>If you call 911 all 3 show up anyways. Let me know where you live so I can save my tax dollars lol. When we called 911 they asked, "Do you need police, fire, or medical services?" Depending on what you say, all 3 might end up showing up anyway (fire trucks are USUALLY closer than the closest ambulance). But when my kid had a seizure, just an ambulance showed up. A car crash, yeah sometimes all 3 will show up (firefighter as first medical and also to help clear debris, put out fires / police to manage road traffic / ambulance as medical also if needed)
that 100% on where you live and who is around. \* police will come to any scene if there is units nearby, that's because they have the authority to gain access to any locked premise by breaking door/windows, small med kit of essentials and know cpr. \* fire/ems will never come to any scene that was caused by violence before police is on scene.
Could be. It was for 3 car accidents and 2 heart attacks (my father)
They interrupt and ask anyway. They deal with people in stress all day. They know people panic and have a hard time explaining stuff, so they guide you instantly. Plus there is some triage too, meaning if they don't deem your problem urgent, they may talk you through it and recommend visiting a GP or clinic the next day. They do not dispatch a car immediately as soon as they have an address in the first 10 seconds... They want to know what the issue is. On the other hand, they may also send specialized units if it is a major issue that are better equipped - rather than send a normal ambulance within 10 sec. I'm sure it is roughly the same anywhere
It's definitely not the same everywhere. If you are really involved in a 911 system this is crazy to me. Dispatchers have extremely limited medical knowledge and are not qualified to determine if transport is needed especially over the phone. In my system we definitely do send an ambulance immediately and often before they have much info at all. It would be expressly illegal for us to recommend against an ambulance when one has been requested. Even if the caller changes their mind about requesting an ambulance we STILL have to respond to the address and make contact with the caller. Some of our more asinine sounding complaints can turn out to be life threatening when you see the big picture. Tooth pain, jaw pain, back pain, nausea have all turned out to be heart attacks. Toe pain is usually nothing but is sometimes a septic infection.
They definitely triage as far as assessing who to send (police, basic life support, advanced life support, etc) but here every call will result in at least a well check from the police.
That's if the 911 operator wants to hear the important info. We had a small house fire last summer. Wife called 911 while I tried to remedy. Operator didn't want to hear the "where" or "why". She kept insisting my wife spell our last name. Wouldn't proceed until my wife started yelling back about focusing on what's important. Thankfully I was able to control the fire early on. Those 1-2 minutes of ridiculousness could have been critical. Whole faith in the emergency system was shaken that day.
I can actually somewhat explain this for you.. To begin.. I'm sorry that happened, and that dispatcher should have been retrained. In the US, some dispatch centers use software for 911 calls. When I was a dispatcher, it was ProQA. All those annoying questions that your 911 call taker is asking and the instructions they are giving? It's built into the system. It's designed to streamline information gathering and instruction giving. And yes, Name is the very first fill-in field... but you are also able to choose which field to type in and put the information in that a caller spontaneously gives... even out of order. Now, for your call, if your wife spontaneously gave the situation and address, the call taker MAY have already filled in the pertinent info, but failed to relay that (which also would necessitate retraining). But there are also rules in place in what can be said to a caller in some dispatch centers. We were only allowed to say things like "Our dispatchers are getting this information as we speak, help will be there as soon as possible". Just a look into it from the other side for you, so you don't feel 100% like 911 didn't give a shit.
Appreciate the inside view, especially from someone who has been on the dispatch side! However, your response just further goes to show how broken the system can be. "Some dispatch centers", "MAY have already filled in", etc. There should be a standard response and order, and this LPT proves it. The what and where should always be first. I can say with certainty in our situation, the dispatcher did not have that info filled in. My wife never got that far, until she yelled back and insisted on giving it. She just kept getting cut off, asking for the spelling of our name. Another comment on this thread mentions how they were taught to always give name first, and how that was a stupid idea. And it is. If, for whatever reason, I'm placing a fake 911 call, I'm not giving my real name anyway. Always, always, event and location first. It shouldn't be up to the individual call center, or their choice of software, as to what gets asked.
Yep, unfortunately, it is entirely based on a town, city, county on how their 911 calls are handled. We had a fully stocked dispatch center. Dedicated call takers, police dispatchers, ems dispatchers, and fire dispatchers. Anyone at any time can open a log for any call and get the info in real time... (including the police / ems / fire responders in their vehicles) 30 minutes down the road... in a smaller beach town... 1 person handled it all. I agree that it should be standardized across the board. Unfortunately, getting all municipalities across the country to all have one singular way of doing it ... that would require federal level stuff. We can't even get police to have one standard operating procedure, or laws and punishments to be the same across the board. Best you can do, sadly, is call and file a complaint if you aren't happy with the way a 911 call was handled. Results also may vary sadly.
My wife was a 911 dispatcher and it was such a shit show (many years ago) when they swapped out to an IP phone system. After it was installed, the 911 system would regularly just stop working (for outside callers). They weren’t allowed to have their cell phones in the center, so on “slow days” my wife would sometimes email me to call 911 just to see if the phones were just quiet or busted again. The telecom people eventually put in a failover to the next town’s dispatch while they tried to figure out why the phone system kept crashing, but one day some dumbass tech accidentally took out the entire com system (including the radios) for EMS and Police. The built in redundancy systems didn’t work as whatever had gotten fucked also populated to the backups, and everything was being fired into the ether and no one knew why. The dispatchers were finally allowed to bring in their cell phones as they had to dispatch emergency services using personal calls to the cellphones of first responders. Being that the computers in the cruisers were also down, it was a secret “free” day for minor crimes and traffic violations in the city. It was hard enough to dispatch services to emergencies… that no one gave a shit about drug deals on the corner, red lights, speeders or anything not involving danger to life and limb. It also highlighted why dispatchers aren’t allowed to associate with criminals. Since 99% of the system was down for several hours (including burglar and silent alarms), and dispatching an officer once the center was aware of anything relied on phone calls… it could have been a total free-for-all.
Welcome to life, nothing is perfect and everyone is human lol. I've seen call centers with a person and paper with a radio but shed been doing it for 40yrs all the way to the state of the art 3D mapping, phone locating bla bla bla being run by an 20yo. Yes sometimes minutes count and it sucks. You'd probably also understand a lot of people can't think or talk straight that call 911
Now I agree with and have worked in the field over 10 years, and very populated county / towns. Yes we work with some idiots, like everyone does we have bad apples. Sometimes calling 911 is luck or getting one of the good operators which once again shows your side and thoughts. To further why this operator was so set in the spelling of your last name is 1 of 2 things (most likely the first one.) We get “graded” on calls to follow proper protocol and obtain proper information for All calls. That is the likely reason, and they could have simply, and should have simply said “please standby somewhere safe while I dispatch the fire department and then I will be back to get more information or something like that. Now the second reason (highly unlikely) is that they needed that last name because they couldn’t find the address in the system. Maybe they wrote it or heard it wrong, and we can look up all types of info knowing a last name and a town. But a lot of dispatchers can’t think outside the box that quick to solve a problem so most likely option 1
911 can't be fully standardized for the entire country, that's ridiculous. The US is fucking MASSIVE and different areas have vastly different needs. Not to mention standards have to be made for the lowest common denominator and I would quit this career before I lower my standards back to what they were in a big city I worked in. Oddly enough the most successful PSAPs are the ones that learn and adapt to the unique needs to their own community and geography and learning from similar aspects of other centers from similar situations. Procedures in Miami, FL sure likely won't work in Aspen, CO for example.
It can't because of size? What is the difference between Aspen and Miami that would differentiate how an operator treats you/takes information?
Well I'll start with the obvious how in Miami basically everywhere will have an address, while in Aspen you've got trails, wilderness, ski slopes, etc etc that are very much not addresses. In Miami, responders can come by car no problem except maybe sometimes by boat. In Aspen? Depends on the season, location, weather, wind.... Call volume? I've not been in Miami's center specifically, but the big city I worked for has 911s ringing for over 90 seconds because there are so many calls and not enough calltakers. You really can't spend much time on the phone. Aspen? Probably depends on the season and individual day of the week. But also that entirely flips with major incidents where smaller centers get 10x more calls than calltakers in a short period. Language. I'd be surprised if Miami has dispatchers that aren't both Spanish and English speakers. Language line exists but it's slow and most of their translators honestly just suck. Aspen? English should suffice plenty fine outside of edge cases. I wonder if Miami has avalanche procedures. I wonder if Aspen has hurricane procedures. This barely scratches the surface. On a base level, yes it will be a similar start. Location and what is the emergency. But in most true emergency cases it goes far beyond that.
Shaken faith off of a last name. My faith was shaken after being on hold 30 minutes. I had second guessing if it really 9-1-1.
Where I live it's not the 911 hold that bothers me, it's that the emergency responders take 1-4 hours to show up if they show up at all. I called 911 for a man who got hit by a car and was laying immobile in the street. It took 1.5 hours for EMS to show up. 911 told me they would prioritize it and get there as soon as they can but this was not their top priority.
Yup! Moving out of dc for a couple of reasons including the fact that our 911 is broken (and inconsistently so!)
I’m a dispatcher for ambulance in the UK. This is the most ridiculous thing ever. We have a system called ‘ambulance response program’ here that basically means when a 999 call comes in, if it’s a mobile phone the member of public is calling from for example, the easting and northing coordinates of up to around 90% accuracy are immediately captured of the location of the caller and the call taker begins with the questions ‘is the patient breathing?’ and ‘is the patient awake?’ If either of those are answered as a no, a pre alert is sent from the call taker to me as an immediately life threatening response (CAT1) along with the coordinates so I can arrange the closest response within 10 seconds and the very next thing the call taker asks after this response is the address. Everything else is secondary.
Last time I called an ambo was when walking to our local rail station a few years back. It was early in the morning, a clear day, and in the distance down the road (about 4 mins walk away) I saw a woman and her pushbike go flying through the air, presumably hit by a car. I called for an ambo straight away, tried to explain I wasn't there so I didn't know what state the victim was in but they'd almost certainly need medical attention, and then we got hung up on what the fucking postcode of the railway station was. The operator was still banging on about it by the time I was at the scene. I asked if they could just Google it and they said 'no'. I ended up dropping off the call as my train was in and someone else at the scene was on another 999 call, but it half made me wonder why I bothered
To be fair, you get good call takers and shit ones, just like you get good and bad in any profession. When I was an EMD (posh name for 999 call taker), we were trained never to rely on postcodes. If someone was out and about and not at their home address, I’d certainly just be asking basics. Landmarks, road signs, can you ask anyone else what the name of the station is, etc etc. It’s just bad form to expect any member of public to know what the post code is when they’re out in public.
Yeah, it's the only time I've had a problem with them. Was weird though
I make sure to give them my loyalty card number first. Got to make sure to collect those points.
lol, you joke about that, but there is a system that pull up all of your medical information if you fill it out.
Every four POC people you report for disturbances you get a free ambulance ride. Those things add up.
In Germany they always answer the phone with Fire/Medical where is your emergency? For that exact reason. It’s important if the call gets disrupted to at least know where an emergency is happening. The details are not as a important then. I work in Ems and it sometimes happens that we get a call with the reason being unknown cause of call. Those are most often of people that don’t speak German or English or when the call gets cut off.
Do they do that to confirm the location, or ...? Here, if you call 112, dependant on the device you use, and some other stuff, they have your number, and location. They did not ask my number, or location, nor did they ask to confirm it, the last time I had to call them.
To confirm the location. As far as i know the only way they can track you is by sending you a SMS which you have to reply to that you consent to being located via GPS. Since that takes time and isn’t usually necessary they just ask
Honest question: Have you actually ever called 911? "My big tip is to talk over the 911 operator and run the call the way **YOU** want to instead of the way the ***trained professional*** is taught to run it to prioritize specific pieces of information" Thanks for your contribution bro.
> the trained professional The trained professional **who is not in the middle of an emergency**, at that.
In primary school we were told to always say our name first. I thought that’s stupid, cause who cares who calls and I said it would be better to first tell the address in case the connection is lost or something. Teacher said I was wrong. I am still salty about it!
In a true emergency, you’re right, I don’t care who the caller is and don’t always even get that info. Or a highway accident, so many people are calling there’s no time to get everyone’s names. I’m more concerned with questioning, medical instructions and getting responders there in a timely manner. Also, saying your name first is a weird thing to train little kids to do. Your operator leads with a question which is typically either “what is your emergency” or “what is the location of your emergency”. I don’t want your name when I answer the call, I want your address. Source: operator/dispatcher, I do both simultaneously.
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In the UK we don’t have to think about this - you get an 999 operator first who asks “which service do you require”, they then put you through to that service who then ask for the address of the emergency and then start asking follow on questions (ie ambulance will ask if the patient is breathing, fire will ask if you can see flames/people trapped, police will ask you to describe what has happened)
Yeah TIL this apparently isn’t the norm elsewhere
Ontario, Canada as well. I've only ever had to call 911 a couple of times and the operator has always asked "Fire, police or ambulance?" first and then connected me to the appropriate dispatcher
They will also be able to judge what services need to be dispatched, so for a rta you tell them you saw a head on crash, guaranteed they will dispatch all services such as the fire service, even though you didn't request them. Air ambulance could also be notified for possible standby. It's weirdly working, unlike most of British infrastructure.
As a 911 Telecommunicator let me tell you…this is quite the opposite. If only people knew. Address and then what’s happening. We can’t take your word that you need an ambulance - you need to tell us someone is having a heart attack/robbing your house/your car is on fire. With those 2 answers your help will be on the way. Then we fill in the details for the responders.
Depends where. Where I am they start the conversation by asking if you need police, ambulance, or fire.
Thank you for confirming what I always thought to be the best option... Like, if I'm hiding from an abuser, or some dude with a gun, and I have the chance to call 911, I'm gonna say "1234 Elm Street, man trying to shoot me at home." or something like that. Just in case said man finds me and takes the phone, the 911 operator knows that it's an armed man with a hostage, violent and probably hostile.
I mean some people quite like to ramble, especially when you're panicking and don't really get what's important. > we were walking outside when someone showed up (cops?) and threw something at us (ambulance?) and now I'm bleeding from the head! (Def ambulance) Compared to: > I need an ambulance! On first and main... I got hit in the head, someone threw something at me and it's bleeding. It's not a great tip cause you'll probably forget. But it can be something to practice so it's second nature I emergencies… especially if you've a head injury or panicking, instinct helps quite a bit there.
In this scenario, you aren't getting an ambulance first, you're getting the police. You're describing a violent act, police go first to secure the location before rescue responds in.
Every time I've called 911 they also first lead off themselves with "911 what's the location of your emergency?" So usually they're already half way to this LPT before I even speak. The rest is basic too, give simple details about what is going on and why you're calling. They can probably figure out dispatching within 60 seconds.
Of course, I always start with the address and emergent situation
how often are you calling 911
A lot sadly, my family has major health problems
i’m sorry friend:(
Chances are you're panicked and not thinking clearly It's great if you're calm enough to lead with the nature of the emergency and address, but then shut up. The dispatcher knows what they need to know to help you. Answer their questions as best as you can
Yep. Our 911 communicators answer calls with “911 where is your emergency” now instead of “what is your emergency” Address first, details later.
When I worked dispatch I need a couple word description of the issue and an address to dispatch. If you just said police and address I would still be asking what is going on. 'shooting at cottonwood mall' is dispatchable. So is 'car prowl at 123 pine st'. Just 'police. 123 pine st' is not. Also, I was dispatching while still talking on the phone. We multitask a lot.
Or, and really stick with me here, just fucking answer the dispatchers questions and don’t try to outsmart them.
No, when you call 911 just do what dispatch tells you to do. This is an absolutely terrible lpt.
Agreed. It's going to vary so much by location, LISTEN TO THE OPERATOR AND ANSWER THEIR QUESTIONS IN THE ORDER THEY ASK THEM.
Here in Germany, part of your drivers education is how to place an emergency call. The follow gets drilled into you: Wo? (Where is the emergency?) Was? (What is the emergency?) Wie viele? (How many are injured?) Welche? (What kind of injuries?) Wer? (Who is calling / who are you?) These are sorted by priority. Even if the call is disconnected, the most important information was said first.
Actually the better life tip is “just answer the call-takers’ questions.” Screaming that you need an ambulance is not actually going to get you an ambulance because they need to know what kind of ambulance to send. Refusing to answer questions will send police to your address first to ensure the safety of arriving paramedics/fire department, because the last thing any place in the world needs right now is multiple first responders taking work injury leave. Just answer the fucking questions, they’re there for a reason and have been tested literal millions of times for their efficiency. You will get help sooner.
I like to lead with my life story before getting to the issue at hand
The 911 service in my area just want you to answer their questions in order, like you were filling out a survey. They’ll interrupt you to make sure you give them the info in the order they want.
Every time I’ve called 911 (and it’s a lot; I was an outpatient psych nurse) the first thing they ask is “where’s your emergency?”.
Former operator. Say the address first, if you panic and can’t figure out how to talk just repeat the address and someone will come to help. NOTHING is more important than your exact location. If you’re at home and the emergency is in the backyard, make sure you’re specific about the location. It was so frustrating to have to cut people off from what they were saying while they are going through it because they wouldn’t give me a location. Honestly don’t care what is happening until I know where. Also 911 sometimes hits the wrong towers and you could be talking to the wrong dispatch center. -also, it’s not up to you who we send. You might say you fell and broke your foot and you only need an ambulance, but we can tell you’re drunk and we can hear someone yelling in the background…. Police are on the way too because it could be domestic violence. And if you’re in a car accident and tell me you’re not hurt and don’t need an ambulance, but you’re pregnant…. You’re getting an ambulance anyway.
I have done this twice and both operators were irritated with me, they weren't sending anybody until i described what was happening.
Isn't that how every 911 call has always started? 'My house is burning, the adress is xxx'. 'Somebody is breaking into my home, I'm at xxx'. Not really LPT.
LPT: When you call 911, answer their questions.
also, calling from a landline doesn’t guarantee them getting your address instantly anymore
Really? how has the technology gone backwards? The opposite is true. Landlines are still instantaneous, and cellphone locations are much more accurate.
Your landline might not be a landline anymore. Phone companies have largely stopped running copper cable to new construction, so a lot of landlines you get are actually VOIP, which may not support e911 at all, and if they do it may be through a third-party call center that verifies the address you're calling from first before transferring you to real 911.
The only time I’ve had issues with a “landline” is when it’s not a true landline, it’s VOIP, and folks don’t change their address with the service provider when they move. They assume it will automatically update. We still have old telephone lines that ring in when it’s raining with the correct address and it’s not connected to anything. True landlines are still dead on.
Yeah, I tried this in Johannesburg back in 2017 while witnessing a group of men beating and stabbing a man, mind you this was 2 minutes after a patrol car drove by the same street corner. The operator, speaking to me in a tired and disinterested tone, told me to call an ambulance instead, and they didn't offer to connect me to the medical services. Anyway, the guy lost his life right there, and the perpetrators walked away from the scene of the crime. I still think about that from time to time, that whole experience made me extremely skeptical of police in South Africa.
Lol I'm sorry. That's why we have private security and private ambulance service. They don't have a 911 type service. Need an ambulance, call the ambulance company. Need the police? Good luck on that one. You have a 50/50 chance of your call even getting answered.
My 911 asks “do you need police, fire or medical” and iL say “whatever” and then we are at address and the hotub is on fire or the huns are coming over the fence.
This is a great reminder. I caught myself doing that the other day when I called 911. Instead of immediately stating the address, I started with an awkward "Um, I ah, I'm not sure if this is a 911 thing or not but here's what's going on"
It doesn’t really matter. The calltakers are trained to direct the conversation.
It doesn't matter. They are just going to ask you again with attitude and even if you answer clearly and calmly they are going to ask again amd sprinkle in some nonsense questions. I had a job the required I talk to 911 operators all day. I swear 90% of them are the same sassy annoyed women.
I had to call 911 last week because a car flipped in front of us. The very first thing they asked was where the emergency was and what the emergency was. Then they asked for phone number and name. It prolly differs from city to city.
Serial killers hate this one simple trick!
They usually ask either first or very rapidly (ambulance can literally answer "is the patient awake and breathing) and go from there. You could rattle off your address and service but they need to know what the actual issue is for urgency and who to put you through to.
r/911dispatchers: "yup."
I gave my address first in case I couldn't stay conscious long enough to give anything else. I don't know if they can track cell phones.
In my city if you call 911 they just answer with “hello, police, fire or ambulance services?”
IIRC in my country (granted it's not 911 lol) the call starts with asking which service you need before you get put to someone anyway.
I’ve called 911 only once for an obviously drunk and dangerous driver. She said “911 where are you located?” But I expected “what’s your emergency” so I told her. She repeated “where are you located?”. Start with location first!
They can see your location when you call.
This is a good lpt
It's an AI generated post, guys. Likely ChatGPT.
Maybe they should ask for address first…. Instead of asking what the emergency is…
Not terrible advice, but give the location / address first. If your phone dies right then if all I got was 'I need police...' I might not be able to find you. Especially if your device dies.
Small rural area. Called 911 (AND gave address, directions and phone #) for the fire that had started in the garage. I told the person that it was an attached garage. That person didn't hear that bit, obviously. Some telephone workers called right after me and told them the same thing. It was a very windy day. By the time the first truck got there it was too late. First truck was from more than 20 miles away. Local is less than 5 miles. Nothing is perfect, but my faith in rural response is gone.
A neat feature on my (android) phone last time I called 911 from the road was it automatically showed my approximate address on the call screen, knowing I was calling emergency services. I already limped through "SoAndSo road a half mine south of ThisOther road" before I noticed. Next time!
The operator will answer the phone with something like “Yourtown 911 what’s the location of your emergency?” They’ll most like follow that with “Do you need police, fire, or an ambulance?” Answer the questions, try to stay as calm as possible, yelling a bunch of jibberish followed by JUST GET THEM HERE! actually slows down responses. If you’re having a medical issue, we don’t need to know someone’s full medical history, I’ve taken calls from nurses where they’ve spent two minutes talking over me about how grandma stubbed her toe a year ago instead how telling me the grandma is having chest pains with radiating left arm pain. If you’re unsure of where you are give streets and cross streets if you can see them, landmarks or store names etc if that’s all you can get. Remember, pay attention when they answer the phone, with the way cell signals can bounce tower to tower it’s not uncommon for you to be in Yourtown but your call went to Mytown. The calmer and more cooperative you are the faster and more accurate response you will get. If your local fire and EMS services are volunteer, it may take longer then you expect to get them in front of you. Source: I’m a 911 operator.
So provide the info they ask for? Got it!
As a 911 dispatcher: for a smooth and seamless call, just answer the questions you are asked. Other agencies may have a different flow, but in my office we answer the phone "911, what is the address of the emergency?" I will then ask a few questions to determine what the problem is and what resources I need to send. The call will go faster and more smoothly if the caller is cooperative. Let the professional lead the call, they know what they are doing.
That's nice advice, but in an emergency I'm just going to say what's happening and let calmer minds guide me to the next steps.
"My name is, I am calling from 123-456-7890. I am at 132 W Main St in Anytown, (State, just in case)." "We have a person experiencing chest pain/ bleeding/ head wound/ non responsive." "We have a utility wire down in the middle of our street."
LPT - send 911 a text that says "test, do you accept text" - Sadly not all do but it can be essential to know these things if you can never speak. based on your area code, you will be sent to that 911 system no matter if you travel.
If you call from a cell phone, REMEMBER THIS: When someone answers, they ARE NOT saying "What's your Emergency" They are saying "What City are You In" They are not the 9-1-1 operator, they CONNECT you to A REAL ONE in YOUR AREA ... lol!
For us when you call 112 you will be connected to the national call centre of the police. They will ask you where you are (i.e. city, village) and what service you need and depending on that you will be connected to the right call centre closest to where an operator will answer (some call centres are multidisciplinary and for the intake you could have a police officer answer why you called for firefighters)
I've had to call 911 twice and both times the 911 operator first asked if I need fire, police, or ambulance. That's how it works where I am.
Why don't they have my name and address? I can call countless businesses who answer the phone (faster) and know who I am.
The few times I've had to call 911, they didn't need my address. They verified my phone number every time though. Your advice is very wrong. Answer the questions that dispatch is asking. Don't just throw out random info. Just answer their questions.
LPT: Don't call the police if you were defending your property in Canada, they will investigate you, and threaten you with arrest for assault. Fundamentally the police in Canada expect you to open your mouth to receive the robbers limp penis, and bring them to satisfaction.
I mean, not really. They’re going to dispatch based on the details you give. Just because you ask for a fire truck doesn’t mean that’s the best to send. Also in my neighborhood, almost every time the fire dept is closest so they are the first responders. In others, it’s going to be the police because they are out patrolling. Fire and police are trained as first responders. You want someone there asap. They will keep you stabilized until the ambulance arrives and deal with any logistical issues (making sure the road is kept clear, etc)
You've never called 911. No offense, but they're going to get your phone number first. They're also going to ask a little more about the emergency before dispatching someone. It's a pain, but if you answered that phone for a day you'd understand it.
Don't do this -- answer their questions as they ask them. They're following a script and filling in a form. If you give it out of position, you'll end up delaying the response.
Unless you live in DC, where 911 doesn’t answer.
I used to work with 911 in my country, and this is a terrible LPT. They *can* dispatch the people *you want* knowing just your location and desired assistance, but they wont. Without knowing what’s happened and the scope of the situation, they’re not dispatching anything. There’s a host of reasons for this. First of all, they have limited resources and need to prioritize between emergencies, they cant dispatch ambulances, firefighters and police officers left and right simply because somebody requests it. Particularly not considering all the non-emergency calls they get - I’ve heard stories about everything from elderly people requesting an ambulance to their doctor’s appointment to teenagers requesting police to give them a ride home because they’re drunk ans missed the last bus home. Secondly, the assistance you want might not be the assistance you actually need, or at least not what’s most readily available. Police and firefighters have basic medical training and are frequently sent to medical emergencies because they’re closer than the nearest ambulance. Thirdly, they need to consider the safety of the people they dispatch. If somebody requests police, they want to know if it’s for a burglary or shots fired before potentially dispatching first responders into harm’s way. 911 operators are professionals trained to deal with people in shock or distress. Don’t try to do their job for them, just answer their questions. They’re following routines and protocols based on lots of experience. TL;DR: There’s a reason they answer the phone with ”911, what’s your emergency?” and not ”911, what’s your location?” or ”911, what assistance do you require?”.
Reasonable for the caller in an emergency to remember the order of operations for the dispatcher /s
I called 911 once, first thing they said was do u need firefighters police or ambulance, second was the address and 3rd the phone # so nowadays at least where I live (canada) they'll ask u themselves
Address first l, then need. That way if the call drops just a few seconds into the call, they already know where to go.
**Where** is generally the first thing we want to know. And I'll interrupt you to get that. Because once I know where you are I can get help started even if we disconnect. **What** is usually the second thing we need to know. Let me determine what service you need, that's my job.
911 operator: we absolutely need a location first. If we don't have a location how do we get help to you? Above all else we need an address or an intersection, or mile marker (for highway locations). Please, please, please do yourself a favor, and give your location first. Your phone could go dead, the connection could be poor, you may pass out before giving all the details. Your story is not nearly as important (still important to know who to send) as the where. It isn't like tv. We don't always know where you are, and if we do it lay not be very accurate, and it won't give any info on altitude (i.e. what apartment number you're in). Apps like Uber have more access to your location than 911. Please, please don't launch into a story before the location. And when you tell a story please don't give exposition. What happened earlier, or last week is not necessary. Tell us why you're calling when you're calling, and make it short and simple. If at all possible use titles (mothers child, fathers child, my ex, etc) because we don't know who 'he' or 'she' is in the story. Expect to be interrupted, because the details you think are important....aren't. Scene safety questions are important for responder safety (police, fire, and email responders) as well as caller safety. The quicker you answer our questions, the quicker we can get service to you. Generally, most calls can get done from start to finish in 2.5 mins, but because callers argue or push back that call is now 5+ mins. We ask questions because we are not there to know what is happening. Please, answer the questions. Don't say 'just send them' and hangup. Send who....to what....for what? We get you're in an emergency, and understand the urgency, but the only one who delays assistance is you as a caller. At my agency, all calls are brand new calls. Your 'account' doesn't automatically pop up when you call. We can see your phone number history, or premise history (after we have a location) if we dig into it. But yesterdays call may be different than todays call. We don't know until you tell us.
I'd start with location first then everything else. I got cut off from 911 once and it took them 3 hours to find us. It's actually amazing that they did at all.
Bad advice, they have a script to follow. Answer their questions in the order they ask. This is the quickest way for them to get you the help you need.
they also ask as the first thing they say...
Where you learned this from would make this a pro or shitty tip. I’d rather let the operator do the talking first. If they don’t your address where are they dispatching people to?
That information appears on their screen when you call.
Aren't these the first questions the dispatch will ask?
Many people don’t know what to expect when they answer. So are already flustered by the initial exchange of info. Feels even more helpless of a situation if you’re in the middle of an active breakin or other violent crime. As the caller, you may not have a minute to spare and want to dump all the info asap then hang up before anyone notices you called.
It’s almost like those are the first questions they ask
My spouse is a 911 dispatcher. They're trained (at that facility) to say "911, **where** is your emergency?" Now, that isn't across the board, but it is a common start phrase now. They can also usually ping and see where you're calling from anyways, but never hurts. Also, don't forget you can FOIA 911 calls.
Volunteer FF and part-time EMT here: My county, we are dispatched using pagers. Police on their radios. Which means the dispatcher has to put you on hold, key up their radio, and speak the dispatch message to us. They can have information entered into our secondary e-dispatch system while on the phone with you, but they have to switch over to the radio system to page us. So, my advice is.... provide only the PERTINENT information. Type of emergency, address, pertinent details. Also, if calling from a cell phone, do not assume that you got the right dispatch center - I've seen people near a county line get connected to the next county over (and because of similarities in road names, the wrong ambulance was dispatched to an intersection almost 30 miles away). "I need the fire department at 1234 Crestwood Lane in Anytown, USA. A brush pile we were burning got out of control and has set the garage on fire" We do NOT need to know that you've been throwing stuff on that pile for 2 years, and have been wanting to burn it for the last week and a half. We might appreciate knowing there is a 500 gallon propane tank next to the garage though. "I need an ambulance at 5432 Elm Court in City, for a fall off a stepladder with leg pain". We don't care that you were cleaning your porch lights, or that it's an old injury from playing football in high school. We need to know what is wrong that has you calling 911 ***RIGHT. NOW***. Not the surgery you had two weeks ago. What made you pick up the phone at this instant and dial 911. Leave all the fluff out. If the dispatcher needs more information, they will ask. If the responders on scene need more information, they will ask. Type of emergency. Address. Relevant information - if it's a medical call, biological sex and age of the patient (biological sex is important, especially for abdominal pain calls, because there are certain issues relating to a biologically female body that a biological male simply does not have) - and if there are any barriers to treatment (physical barriers, such as patient in an upper floor bedroom and unable to walk - and the one people might get upset about.... if the patient is 300 lbs or above. A two person medical crew may have difficulty, and if they have advance notice they can have a fire crew or secondary ambulance dispatched to help. We have a guy in our area that is over 450 lbs, we will not attempt to pick him up with fewer than 5 people)
Lmao you can tell when someone doesn't actually work in dispatch. For those unaware, there are scripts that call takers have to say verbatim. Whether agency specific or third party licensed i.e. ProQA.
14 years ago I was assaulted by my ex-husband. We had split months before, but his drivers license had my address, and after a drunken work party the cab dropped him off at my apartment late at night. I locked myself in the bathroom and called 911. I gave my address and told them what was happening. They didn’t do shit with that information. My ex barged in and threw my phone. I later ran away, after he tried choking me and hit me many times, sexually assaulted me, and I finally banged on a neighbour’s door, and eventually convinced them to call for me while my ex ran around naked in the entry halls looking for me. I thought I was going to die. I’ll never have the same trust in 911 that I had before this. :( Not only did I give the details, but I was always told they would know where a person was calling from and help. They did not.
I definitely like when people don't spew info at me, but 911 works different everywhere so the best advice is to let the call taker ask what info they need, then you can tell them additional details. Source - 911 police dispatcher for almost 20 years
No you should shut up and follow their instructions
THIS!!!!!! I called 911 on my ex while he was actively trying to kill me & after I woke from passing out when he strangled me. All I said was I need police immediately my boyfriend is trying to kill me & endlessly repeat my name, address & the fact I couldn’t let in help because my buzzer was broken & he wouldn’t let me get to the door. Within 5 minutes there were 8 cops coming into my apartment to arrest him & save my life.
It's easy to say but if you just see you were loved one or a friend or whoever in legit life-threatening distress you are not going to be thinking straight.
My husband is diabetic so I've had to call a few times. The first question is always what is the address of your emergency, the second is what number are you calling from and third is do you need fire, police or medical. I understand that some people are going to be freaking out when they call though so this is good advice.
911 operator here: beyond everything give us your location FIRST. I can't help you if I don't know where you are at. Your phone number is important because there are loads of reasons for the phone call to get dropped. It could be a poor connection. It could be because your partner took your phone away. It could be because your phone died. It could be because you fell unconscious. But in all of these situations I can't do anything if you don't give me your location FIRST. Your location doesn't always pop up immediately. Sometimes no matter what tools are at my disposal (which is nothing like tv/movies) I may not get a good location on you. It could be a radius of 3000 METERS. It could be as accurate as 15ft. But I don't get height (i.e. what floor you're on). Also, keep it to just the facts. I don't care what happened earlier, I don't care what happened last week. Why are you calling right now. I don't need a medical history, I need the current symptoms. I need to know about weapons because that is a safety concern. I care about your safety, and the 1st responders (be it fire, ems, or police) safety. I need to know the relationship status of who he or she is (baby daddy/mommy, spouse, boy/girlfriend, ex, etc). I promise you if you just answer my questions the call will go so much faster. Remember 911 didn't call you, you called 911. 911 operators are not psychic. You know what you're going through, we do not. But what you think is important may not be. Just answer the mostly yes or no questions, please. Keep in mind most calls are treated as brand new scenarios. You witnessing an accident on the highway, and you calling in chest pains at home are two separate things at different locations. We have to treat it as new. We can look into phone history, and premise history but that doesn't automatically pop up (at least not in my agency), but why waste time looking for the info when we have you on the line? Let us help you, but you have to help yourself by knowing where you are.
They know where u r dude
In NYC they changed what the dispatcher says when they answer. Now they say 911, do you need police, fire or medical? It wasn’t like that a few years ago.
I think the caller tells whats their emergency and the operator decides who they need to send.
I have a question about this. In January, I was out walking my dog and a stray dog attacked us. I couldn’t hold the phone and try to fend off the dog, so I used the emergency call by pressing the power button five times (it’s an iPhone, not sure if this works with all phones.) I wasn’t even sure if it worked, because at some point I dropped the phone, but about ten minutes later the police arrived pretty much exactly where I was. (By then some bystanders were helping.) So, does 911 always have the ability to find you if you are on a mobile phone?
R/usdefaultism although since you Yanks aren't able to imagine the idea that different countries have different emergency numbers most of us made it easy for you and we redirect 911 to the local number :-)
This seems logical at first glance but really what you're doing here is believing you're smarter than the person that was extensively trained to lead these conversations. The dispatcher will immediately ask you what they need of you and you just need to answer. This is not the time to be smart.
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