911 call

[1 old 0311]

This may, or may not, belong on THR so feel free to delete if not appropriate.

I really don't know who to contact about this, so I thought I would try here.

A friend of mine is a recent widow with two small children. A former friend of her husband's went to her house early in the morning and wanted to borrow money. She didn't have anything to give him, but he wouldn't leave, or take no for a answer. She sent me a text message, didn't want him to hear her, asking me to call 911 for her. I did, and the Police made him leave.

The question is can you TEXT a help call to 911? Thanks!

 

[PTK]

The question is can you TEXT a help call to 911? Thanks!

No. AFAIK, it's voice-only.

 

[cassandrasdaddy]

check

with organizations for the hearing impaired they have a method tocall

 

[1 old 0311]

Thanks for the answer. Don't think I have ever seen it brought up.

 

[cassandrasdaddy]

if you find out could you let us know? i might set up a message template to let me holler for help

 

[Treo]

with organizations for the hearing impaired they have a method tocall

They either use TTY or video relay.

Or you could just dial 911 and drop the phone they will lock on the phone and send everybody.

 

[Samuel Adams]

I've been working in a dispatch center since 1982. She should have dialed 911 from a landline phone instead of taking the time to text somebody else. Dialing 911 from a cell phone won't guarantee that the dispatch center will get a location or a call back phone number while dialing from a landline will.

 

[tacweapon]

I work at a 911 center and the answer is no you can not text message 911, but what you can do is dail 911 and if you can not talk just listen to the operator and they will typically attmept to get you to talk and if you do not talk they will use the TTY feature to send a message to the phone that will come across as words depending on the PSAP is what it says but ours says something like this " This is a 911 center please do not hang up Do you have an emergency ? If yes press 1 If no press 2 GA " That is not exact but it close and what should happen is if the caller has an emergency they would press 1 then call taker would send start asking the caller what kind of emergency they have by using yes or no questions and the caller using 1 for yes or 2 for no. I am sure that some PSAPs do things different but if we recieve a 911 Openline from a cell phone we try to get the person on the line to talk and atleast tell us where they are so we can send help a problem that happens with 911 Openlines is that we usually get is the location of the cell phone tower that the phone is hitting off of or we get the cell phone to plot and we know that the person is within 200 yards of that area

I hope this helps

 

[cassandrasdaddy]

thanks very much

 

[TallPine]

You could email them and then they will email you a picture of a cop back about three weeks later

 

[d906670]

I have always been told to dial 911 and drop the phone and they will automatically send the police to see whats up.

 

[Robby]

In the case of a landline, and enhanced 911 that should work. Of course, I thought the person should have dialed 911, and started telling the non welcome visitor, is a loud voice, No!! Leave My House! I do not have any money for you! "You get that idea, the 911 operator would know there was a problem from that for sure.

 

[1 old 0311]

Problem here was there was no landline.

 

[Steve Raacke]

No landline here either. We are cellphone only. One thing which I have here is a online form at the 911 center websie where citizens can fill in their cellphone number and vital information such as name and address. The information is there when you call from your cellphone. Now, it's true that you may not be at home when you cal 911 on your cell but it gives the 911 operator something to work with.