EBENSBURG -- According to the Federal Communications Commission, it's estimated that about 70 percent of 911 calls are placed from wireless phones and that percentage is growing.
The problem is, 911 dispatch centers can't always get a precise location when you call in from a cellphone.
Last year, Cambria County 911 processed 60,000 calls. About 40,000 of those came from cellphones.
And right now, it's not as simple as it may seem to find you in an emergency, with outdated technology still in use.
At the Cambria County 911 center, every call can be a matter of life or death.
"OK. My partner has dispatched the ambulance,” the dispatcher said. “If anything changes or she gets worse in any way, just call us back for further instructions."
While dispatchers request assistance from first responders, apps such as Uber allow you to request a car to pick you up within minutes.
"We'll get a request. We'll select it. And then it will automatically go to Google Maps," Uber driver David Dorian said.
While many apps, such as Google Maps, which Uber uses, can pinpoint your location instantly, it's not always that simple for 911 centers.
"Police dispatch. Do you need an officer?"
"Many people think that if they're dialing 911 that we should know where they are, and that's not the case,” said Robbin Melnyk, Cambria County 911 director. “In most of the time, that's not the case."
She said it's frustrating sometimes not knowing exactly where a caller is.
"Any of these calls coming in, the dispatcher knows as soon as it's ringing that that's a cellphone call that's calling in. This is an example of what one looks like,” Melnyk said while pointing to a computer. “This is a cellphone call that's coming in, and it's wireless phase one, which is more challenging for us."
It’s challenging because 911 doesn't use the GPS in your cellphone, as many apps do. A landline phone is linked to an address, but if you're calling from a cellphone, the current system uses three separate satellites or cell towers, depending on your phone, to triangulate a location.
We made a test call to 911, and my location came from the cell tower on New Germany Road.
"So that location is clearly not telling me that I'm in the dispatch center,” I said.
“No,” Melnyk replied.
“How far away is that?” I asked.
“From here, a half-mile, You know, straight line," Melnyk said.
My call started as a phase one, which only gives you a cell tower location.
"If he waits 10 to 15 seconds, and then he rebids it, which is what he just did, and it's showing 401 Candlelight Drive," Melnyk said.
That next step is phase two, which gave my location as closer to where I was, but was still not precise.
Depending on the technology in your phone, Melnyk said, 911 can pinpoint your location between 50 and 300 meters.
That might sound like a close proximity, but it's really not.
"If you take any address in Johnstown and say, 'It's 100 meters from this location,' one way or another, you could end up capturing 30 different houses," Melnyk said.
Uber driver Dorian is shocked that he can find a rider more quickly than emergency medical technicians can find a victim in an emergency.
"God forbid you need that 911 call. We need to be there,” Dorian said. “We need to have access to technology that's the same for, you know, Uber."
"The technology is there. Obviously, we're using it for other things,” Melnyk said. “It just isn't into the 911 centers yet."
The future system already has name: Next Generation 911.
"The technology is being updated to accommodate that technology of pinpointing it,” Melnyk said. “It's just it doesn't happen as quickly as it would to go buy a new cellphone."
Melnyk said cellphone providers need to take some responsibility.
"Our phone systems take longer, so the technology demand is on the cellphone providers to get that information to us here in the 911 center," Melnyk said.
"We're in an age of technology where we've got to be state-of-the-art and we have to be on our A game with everything,” Dorian said. “Unfortunately for 911, that's sad."
In certain life-threating situations, 911 can contact the phone company and get them to ping the exact location, but even that takes time, which could lead to dangerous delays, as seen in cases throughout the country.
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