STOP abusing our 911 system! We know this is not intentional, but it’s occurring.
Mount Pleasant PD is the 911 hub for Titus County. All 911 calls come to the Communications Center and are routed to appropriate agencies.
Every day the 911 center receives false 911 calls due to accidental dialing and kids playing on phones. Many of these 911 calls are coming from deactivated cell phones. When a cell phone is deactivated a cell number is no longer associated with that phone. In most cases the 911 service still works on a deactivated cell phone.
Many people don't realize the 911 service will still work and give the deactivated cell phone to their small children so they can play games on them. These devices were not intended to be your child's toy.
The GPS on deactivated phones does not work and we cannot see where the call is coming from. We cannot trace the phone or even call it back. In most cases the kids we are talking to refuse to give the phone to a parent when we ask them to.
Recently our 911 center received over 100 phone calls from one child over several days. These calls were coming from a deactivated cell phone. These false 911 calls caused a considerable disruption to our county 911 system, but we got lucky. These 911 calls did not occur during a real emergency.
Research shows this is a prolific problem across the States. We need your help because this is a big problem in our community. If you allow a child to play on your phone please don’t allow them to play with it unattended. Calling 911 is for emergencies. Someone’s life may depend on 911 being available. That life could be yours.
If you know someone who has children please share this message.
No comments:
Post a Comment