When we first moved here and lived in an apartment, heard a woman screaming for help in the next building’s balcony. After we called, things quieted down. Cops woke us up 2 hours later to ask which building.
Eldest (12 yr old) home alone on Sat morning while I ran errands. Man came into the yard and began looking into various windows. Continued all around the house, even in backyard. Eldest called me, I called 911 to report and ask for a policeman to drop by. 911 operator refused, saying they didn’t go to calls unless a crime was clearly underway. I arrived home soon after, but trespasser had left.
Mentally ill driver decided I had somehow cut off a fire truck somewhere, and decided to punish me by repeated brake-checking and swerving (running me off the road a few times). I called 911 and followed their instructions to stop at a public place (gas station). Crazy guy got out and spent the next 15 minutes screaming at me and trying to yank my door* open, before the police arrived and took him away. They confirmed via radio that no fire trucks had rolled that morning and crazy guy was just that – crazy. I kept the gun aimed at him thru the door thru the whole tirade so wasn’t worried about being harmed. I just made sure it was under my coat so it didn’t agitate him further.
Needless to say, my confidence in being rescued by 911 is precisely zero. With response time sampling of 2 hours, 15 minutes, and never, I would be foolish to depend on them. Not blaming the police since they can’t be everywhere at once, just being realistic.
*I keep vehicle doors locked all the time, every time. No exceptions.
I’m pretty surprised at the ratio of yes to no. To be clear, I have called the local non-emergency number when I’ve seen water main breaks or broken traffic lights, and things like that. But, man, I’ve lived a sheltered life. It wouldn’t occur to me to call 911 for a car accident where no one was hurt – I’d call the non-emergency number for that, too. The last time I got into a car accident (spun around on an icy patch on the NJ Turnpike into the guardrail), I didn’t have a phone with me anyway so we just waited until a patrol car drove by.
Newtosite, uh, that escalated quickly. I was reading thinking I may not have called for those first two, and then I got to the third.
I think I would be wary of calling 911 for any fights that I hear from any distance. I would think the people involved would call if they thought it was necessary and getting police involved can lead to very serious consequences, even if a police presence wasn’t necessary.
Anyway, thanks for sharing, everyone. I really need to get out more, I guess.
Our local 911 is supposedly handled from the Sheriff’s office in our one and only Justice Center, but sometimes I doubt it. The other day I called to report some dangerous-looking debris in the road, probably the aftermath of an accident. The operator said the intersection I gave was not in the database, although the road has been there since the 1850’s, any local would know where it was, and the street sign said exactly what I reported. Not too serious in this case, but what if there had been a major accident?
A few medical emergencies, road hazards and several drunk driver reports. I drive the Long Island Expressway a lot for work, and also to get to some favorite areas out east.
One drunk was a beat up commercial step van doing 30 to 35 (55 limit) in the middle lane in heavy but moving traffic. wandering half way into the left lane to halfway in the right lane. As I couldn’t maintain that speed, I doubled back a few exits up and saw him maintaining, next exit I doubled back again and at a (now closed) rest area, saw him pulled over at the very entrance with the lit up patrol car.
Another was a school bus wandered on to the shoulder. I pulled up next to him and saw that he was out of it, so I went back behind and called 911. I said I would follow him to keep them updated on his location. A few miles later he exited, driving another 3 or 4 miles wandering into the oncoming lane and back to the shoulder. I finally saw him pull into an elementary school and get in line for dismissal. I made a u turn and in the minute it took to get back, he was surrounded by 3 patrol cars.
I can remember two times. Once when my and my housemate’s house was on fire, I had to run to our neighbors to call the fire squad from there. The good thing was that the fire department is only 300 meters down the road, and they arrived early enough to save the house, but my housemate (and best friend) nearly died and had severe smoke poisoning. The other time was also quite critical, I had a collision between three cars including mine in the middle lane of a very busy Autobahn. Nobody was hurt, but three cars were standing in the middle lane with traffic rushing by, and I didn’t know how to behave and called 110 (police). All turned out well.
Once to report our apartment had been burgled.
Once to report a home invasion in progress (I didn’t dial, had been beaten to it, but stayed on the line to give the address).
Once to report my Grandmother’s stroke.
Once to report a motorcyclist gone off the road and off her bike.
Once to report a senior who’d fallen and broken her wrist.
Shortly after our city started using 911 (I think 1984) and before cell phones, I saw there was a “fresh” car accident on the opposite side of a very busy street near my home one evening. The two directions of traffic were separated with a rather wide boulevard so seeing totally accurate specifics of casualties was not possible. It would have been a hazard to stop my car and try to j walk across the street to see the severity of it and besides, that was already starting to happen on the proper side. I drove the short remaining distance home and called 911.
As I didn’t know the severity of any injuries, the numbers involved etc., I was unable to advise the 911 operator of anything more than there was an accident, the number of vehicles and the location. As a result the operator in a very strong threatening tone told me that my call was not a “proper” 911 call and the fact that I did not have the information that was needed to call the authorities my call was “mischief” and that I could be brought up on charges that could include a jail sentence and heavy fines. I rather abruptly advised that was not possible due to circumstances and then just hung up the phone as it appeared I was potentially getting into trouble.
Fortunately, in the 35+ years since I haven’t had to call 911 but that experience definitely gives me pause over “see something, say something”.
About 4 or 5 times, always for medical emergencies, typically back when my elderly mother was living with us.
The strange thing around here is that a fire truck ALWAYS arrives along with the ambulance. ALWAYS. No matter what the medical issue is. And at NO time have these guys done anything useful. Why they always show up is a mystery. I’ve heard that it may be related to some union deal that gives them extra time on active duty. In theory fire services might arrive first and they do have some rescue equipment, but I’ve never seen that actually happen. Their main function seems to be to stand around. It’s always the EMTs from the ambulance crew who attend to the situation, and they’ve always been wonderful.
You should have reported the idiot. Since all 911 calls are recorded the incident would have been easy to verify. I would think they’d have been disciplined or fired.
Technically yes, but accidentally. Back in Sacramento with its 916 area code my finger slipped and I pressed 1 twice. I immediately realized what I’d done and hung up but they called back to check in on me.
My wife called 911 when I was driving into Carlsbad, NM one night about a week ago. A car in front of us was swerving and drifting out of their lane on numerous occasions. It seems dangerous, and likely a sign of impairment not a once off distraction, so we phoned it in. Not sure what came of that. They said they’d send someone to check.
Using today’s logic yes, I agree however at the time there were very active public announcements on when to use 911 and when not to and it was not at all clear. Of course at the time I had to make the presumption that I was the one that was badly in the wrong.
At first I remembered a few times, but the more I thought about it the more times I remembered either calling 911 myself or being part of a situation where 911 was called. So probably 10 times in my life, starting back in 1980 before they had 911 emergency calling.
I voted no in the poll because I’ve never called 911 on purpose, but I have done exactly the same thing you did. Back when I lived in Raleigh’s 919* area code, it had recently split into two area codes, requiring dialing the area code for even local calls. One day the 1 key on my phone got stuck and I ended up with 911. I immediately hung up when I realized what had happened, they called back and asked if there was an emergency, I said “No, I misdialed”, they immediately hung up.
*By odd coincidence, I now live in Sacramento’s 916 area code.
woke up 3 AM with stomach pain, I called the Dr and he said it could be your heart so call 911. Fire Dept shows up first and gives me EKG and says your heart looks OK. Paramedics show up few minutes later and said it might be gallstones want to go to ER? I said sure but they never saw any gallstones on ultrasound. 3 years later pain returned and I had stones so they took out my gallbladder.
Once. I was walking my dog through a park near my house. There was a wooden bridge over a small creek that we always crossed. That day there was a girl, maybe 14-15, kinda gothy looking and she was sitting on the bridge, right in the middle and she was writing on the wooden bridge “guard rails” with a marker. This was not a highly graffiti prone park and the first weird thing was that as we approached she ignored us and continued writing. As we passed behind her I read some of what she was writing and it seemed highly suicide-y. At first I chalked it up to angsty teen stuff but as I walked I remembered that someone had hung them self from that bridge not long before. This was before I had a cellphone so I took a two block detour to a gas station and called 911 on the payphone. We continued our loop and crossed over the bridge on the way back and she was still there, no cops in sight. The next day the graffiti was gone.
Several times. Once when I was driving and watched a large tree-house fall off a truck, completely filling one lane on an interstate. Another time when I was on an island on a lake, and across the lake I watched a house burst into flames. Once when I had chest pain.
Yeah. I’ve called the non-emergency number more.
Oh yeah, that happened to me once, too. They insisted on sending someone over to check it out. Which I’m sure was the right thing to do, but it was late at night and I had to get dressed so that I didn’t feel too weird talking to the officer who came by.