Calling 911 for a snake?
June 20th, 2008, 8:55 am · Post a Comment · posted by kylew
You’ll find a story on when it is and isn’t appropriate to call 911 in the June 21 edition of the Crestview News Bulletin.
The story idea was sparked by the interest in a recent letter to the editor submitted by a woman who called 911 when she was cornered by a snake in her backyard and initially was told to call back on a non-emergency line.
Crestview Fire Department Capt. Eric Garcia, the supervisor for Crestview’s 911 dispatch system, said the call has been a frequent topic of conversation in his department.
Garcia said he reviewed the call. He said if he had taken the call, his first reaction also would have been to tell the caller to call back on the non-emergency line. He said the caller sounded calm, and that it was not clear the situation was an emergency. He said 911 dispatchers are trained to ask callers to call back if, for example, they are in their kitchen and they see a snake in the yard.
Garcia said the situation changed when the caller added that she was “cornered” by the snake.
The key word was “cornered”; not necessarily “snake”
“At that point, it became an emergency situation,” Garcia told me. At that point, the call became a 911 situation.
The moral of the story: If you are in the safety of your home and see a large snake in the yard, call the non-emergency number.
If you are cornered, then by all means call 911.
