911 GPS

[Niteshift]

My county has become the first in the state to equip its 911 system with a GPS that will allow 911 dispatchers to locate you if you are calling from a cell phone.

Anyone else have this in their community? Does it work?

[NeoCop]

Wow...its great...i think it will be very useful for the ones who are really in need. Well...we dont have that kind of TECHNOLOGY in this part of the world yet. MiddleEast/Asia....damn...LOL!!!

[Army MP]

I think every department needs to be able to do that. As it is right now, it won't even show the name of the caller when someone uses a cell phone to call 911, just what tower it's signal is going through. Which seems pretty bad, since my caller i.d. at home will tell me who is calling from the cell phone.

Mike

[Niteshift]

As I understand it (I may be wrong), since the call is often routed through several towers, the caller ID part isn't that simple. For example, my phone number does not show up on my mothers called ID, but it does show up on my buddy's cell phone (different company). So even that is hit and miss.

Where I'm going to find it interesting is that we have some people (dealers mainly), that will call in a false complaint via cell phone, to a location on the other end of a zone from where they are in order to keep the cops out of the neighborhood. I wonder if this will help us knock that out.

[WHC166]

Kansas is working on that now....a bill passed this last session created funding for it, so hopefully we aren't too far behind you!

[Sig220Man]

We have this technology in certain parts of California.

One day, while working dispatch, I received one of those calls (it was a misroute from CHP, as my area does not yet have this). Where an address would normally pop up on the 911 screen, it gives an approximate location of the caller, by indicating the Thomas Guide map page and grid #. For some reason (probably privacy-related), it won't give the EXACT location of the caller.

[Lightfighter]

That's neat. It never ceases to amaze me the things that they can come up with.

[Joseph]

Louisiana is looking in to it but it may be a year or two before it's implemented.

[Z28CBR]

I have a friend that works for a cell phone company and she says that this technology is really everywhere, it's just a matter of who can afford to run it, as far as getting the equipment on your end to implement the program. She explained to me that right now most cell phones can be located within a 3 block radius. I'm glad someone is finally able to use the tracking system.

[tcsd1236]

We have it here in my county. If you're doing your job, you don't need to worry about whether someone is monitoring your location. I am glad to have the technology available.