ABILENE, TX — Q: Can you text to 911 in an emergency? — Abilene

A: There’s a lot more to it than I would have thought.

Wayne Brandt, communications manager with the Abilene Police Department, explained it to me this way:

“It is not currently possible to text 911 in Abilene with our current analogue system. There is a project in progress called Next Generation 911. Several agencies across the nation are testing different systems that will allow texting and sending video to 911. Some local agencies have developed the ability to receive text messages through their phone systems but they don’t receive texts through 911. This is a national project that will take some time to determine appropriate hardware, software and procedures. Once those decisions are made then the conversion will need to be funded and implemented. There is no end time line date established at this point but I would think several more years.

“One big problem today in texting 911 is that text messages are placed in a queue. The message may or may not be sent immediately. This is one of the issues that need to be worked out. Along with texting to 911, Next Generation also will allow us to receive photographs and video.

“The city of Abilene Public Safety Answering Point (PSAP) received about 76,500 911 calls in calendar year 2010. So far this year we have received 65,336. When we receive a 911 call from a land line (or hard-wired phone) we receive the name, address and phone number of the caller. We verify that address with the caller to make sure it is correct. Rarely is the information incorrect.

“An incoming 911 call from a cellphone gives us the name of the service provider (such as AT&T, Sprint, etc.), the phone number and an estimated longitude/latitude coordinate based on cell tower triangulation. Approximately 85 percent of our 911 calls originate from cellphones.

“Some cellular service providers are still in Phase 1 and their location estimate is not very close. Most service providers are using Phase 2 and can estimate a cellphone location very close. There are issues that will affect that estimated location.

“We have tested calls to 911 from right here in the Communications Center at 450 Pecan St. Typically, the estimated location given is South Fifth Street and Oak Street. That location is the southwest corner of the building. Sometimes the estimated location given will show to be at South 14th Street at Maple Street. This variance occurs because of the availability of cell towers and which tower the caller happens to be hitting at the time they make the call.

“We do have the ability to contact the cellular provider to attempt to get a better location. That takes time. We first have to determine and verify the company that has that phone number. Then we call the company to get them started on finding a location. We will then fill out an ‘exigent circumstance’ form explaining our need to have that location. Once the form is received the cellular company will call us back and give us the longitude/latitude coordinates. Lastly we process those coordinates through our Computer Aided Dispatch (CAD), which will map those coordinates. Of course mobile phones being mobile, the person calling us may very well have moved to a different location by the time we get first responders on the scene.

“You can see that the most important information any 911 center needs to respond to any emergency is the location. We can’t send help or the appropriate help until we know where to send the help.”

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