You’ve obviously never spent much time around a 911 dispatch center.

That is a big deal, particularly when it’s happening fifty or so times a day.

MTV

mtv wrote:You’ve obviously never spent much time around a 911 dispatch center.

That is a big deal, particularly when it’s happening fifty or so times a day.

MTV

Flew medevac for a while, and some dispatchers can be…interesting people


But in the article the supervisor herself said it was no factor..so meh


Besides I don’t think Vail Colorado EMS and PD are insanely busy running back to back calls, nor do I think dispatch is stressed too much, it’s also funny Atlanta or Dallas emergency services arnt writing these articles, and it also didn’t sound like they were launching helicopters and the cavalry for every iPhone, sounds more like a sleepy vacation town writer who needed to pump out a story to me

Vail isn’t in summit county. The story I heard on the radio was summit county.
Over the last couple of weeks, I wouldn’t call resort towns sleepy. It’s the busiest time of year. Mountain Rescue Aspen was just called out the other night for a hiker. Roads have been crap the last week, lots of rain mixed with snow, so I’m sure lots of 911 calls.
I70 was a total mess the couple days before Christmas, closed due to stuck semis and wrecks.

StillLearning wrote:Vail isn’t in summit county. The story I heard on the radio was summit county.
Over the last couple of weeks, I wouldn’t call resort towns sleepy. It’s the busiest time of year. Mountain Rescue Aspen was just called out the other night for a hiker. Roads have been crap the last week, lots of rain mixed with snow, so I’m sure lots of 911 calls.
I70 was a total mess the couple days before Christmas, closed due to stuck semis and wrecks.

This! While our town is nothing compared to vail, it is a sleepy resort town until those busy weeks - Christmas week for instance. Our EMS/rescue services are just fine until thousands of people descend on us for days at a time. Then we are stretched to the brink. Ski patrol, forest rangers/search & rescue, fire/ems are all at their limit and then some. When the ski resort alone has a dozen ambulance calls (Average in town is a couple/day normally) and the nearest hospital is 40+ miles away, that leaves no room for extra. That doesn't include hikers/snowshoers, backcountry skiers, snowmobilers, ice fishermen, ect. While I am not against the I-phone ELT by any means if there is a issue with false alarms it can be a BIG deal for certain areas and needs to be addressed. That doesn't mean we should not have them, just get the technology in line.

Pete

I didn’t see anything that said it was taking EMS out of service, from the reading it sounds like it’s just dealt with by dispatch, the lead dispatcher even said it wasn’t a factor


Sounds like news porn.. like the old story about cell phones giving you brain cancer back in the day, do they have radiation, sure, is it something to be worried about, no


Ever look at the news only for it to say “it was a nice but slow day today, so now back to womens beach volleyball”

NineThreeKilo wrote:I didn’t see anything that said it was taking EMS out of service, from the reading it sounds like it’s just dealt with by dispatch, the lead dispatcher even said it wasn’t a factor


Sounds like news porn.. like the old story about cell phones giving you brain cancer back in the day, do they have radiation, sure, is it something to be worried about, no


Ever look at the news only for it to say “it was a nice but slow day today, so now back to womens beach volleyball”

Yep, that may in fact be the case....right up till a REAL emergency call comes in while everyone is trying to figure out whether that iPhone call is "real" or not. Ski slope implies that, if a skier whose phone signalled doesn't answer the call back, ski patrol is going to have to go look. So, now ski patrol is out of position when the REAL emergency comes in. Etc.

Who gives a shit about a quote cited by a reporter? Nothing bad happens till something really bad happens, THEN the quote is going to be very different. No question that serious emergencies don't happen every minute of every day. That's the message I read from that dispatcher. But, every day isn't the point of HAVING dispatch, EMS, Ski Patrol, etc. It's that ONE time, that ONE moment, when someone's life is in danger, and you can't get a call through.....

MTV

mtv wrote:

NineThreeKilo wrote:I didn’t see anything that said it was taking EMS out of service, from the reading it sounds like it’s just dealt with by dispatch, the lead dispatcher even said it wasn’t a factor


Sounds like news porn.. like the old story about cell phones giving you brain cancer back in the day, do they have radiation, sure, is it something to be worried about, no


Ever look at the news only for it to say “it was a nice but slow day today, so now back to womens beach volleyball”

Yep, that may in fact be the case....right up till a REAL emergency call comes in while everyone is trying to figure out whether that iPhone call is "real" or not. Ski slope implies that, if a skier whose phone signalled doesn't answer the call back, ski patrol is going to have to go look. So, now ski patrol is out of position when the REAL emergency comes in. Etc.

Who gives a shit about a quote cited by a reporter? Nothing bad happens till something really bad happens, THEN the quote is going to be very different. No question that serious emergencies don't happen every minute of every day. That's the message I read from that dispatcher. But, every day isn't the point of HAVING dispatch, EMS, Ski Patrol, etc. It's that ONE time, that ONE moment, when someone's life is in danger, and you can't get a call through.....

MTV

But that’s not how it works, they are not standing down all of dispatch to deal with a iPhone ELT, just like they didnt do that with the older iPhone SOS

The quote also was from the dispatch supervisor, so I’d say her opinion trumps most

The one moment you can’t get you call through? Little dramatic eh?

Huh,

Interesting conversation. Not sure how it got adversarial. Personally I would rather argue over something important, like who is up next at the pool table, or did you just look at my woman, or the true debate of the century is there really such a thing as a boneless chicken wing (Clearly not, those are called chicken tenders). Now those are worth fighting over. These phones, like any new technology are probably a good thing, but like almost all new stuff need tweaking. While the impact may be negligible, it's there. I was talking to the GM at our Mt. yesterday (About other stuff) and asked him if they had any issues. Turns out they got several calls from 911 dispatch over the holiday week. They get a location (Even has the trail name) and have to send out patrol to check it out. When patrol arrives, no one is there, because they just fell, were not injured and skied away. Minimal, but still ties up resources. I would imagine the same would happen with a backcountry skier and then search & rescue would be involved, or maybe a pilot that dropped his phone at a remote strip and activated the thing. In most cases this is happening where cell service is spotty at best, so no call back to make sure it was a false alarm. There is also the potential to put responders in dicey situations over nothing. Big problem, probably not, but as more of these make it into the population, it could become more of a issue. Oh and about the cellphone cancer thing. I am not convinced that's not true. Maybe it's the person on the other end, but maybe not - I often get unexplained earaches while on the phone....

Pete

pburns wrote:Interesting conversation. Not sure how it got adversarial...

Agreed... these are always such foolish threads with folks arguing over which "thing" is best. I've never been a "pick one" kind of a guy.

If one serious about safety, one should have as many of these as possible, preferably all. If you kvetch about the cost, keep in mind that most decent backcountry airplanes start at over $100k these days, with the median net investment north of a quarter of a mil. Safety gear is a rounding error...

Everyone makes their own calculation on what is necessary, but for me:

• Have a modern 406ELT with GPS interface installed in your aircraft.
• Keep a late model PLB in your pocket such as the ACR ResQLink
• Run a Garmin inReach like the Explorer+ while you fly
• Keep a sat phone in your bugout bag.
• Keep your iPhone charged

Bigrenna wrote:

pburns wrote:Interesting conversation. Not sure how it got adversarial...

Agreed... these are always such foolish threads with folks arguing over which "thing" is best. I've never been a "pick one" kind of a guy.

If one serious about safety, one should have as many of these as possible, preferably all. If you kvetch about the cost, keep in mind that most decent backcountry airplanes start at over $100k these days, with the median net investment north of a quarter of a mil. Safety gear is a rounding error...

Everyone makes their own calculation on what is necessary, but for me:

• Have a modern 406ELT with GPS interface installed in your aircraft.
• Keep a late model PLB in your pocket such as the ACR ResQLink
• Run a Garmin inReach like the Explorer+ while you fly
• Keep a sat phone in your bugout bag.
• Keep your iPhone charged

Agree 100%

The thing with the sat iPhone, if it could a few of those bullet points, and still be a iPhone, cuts down on the gear and subscriptions

pburns wrote:Huh,

Interesting conversation. Not sure how it got adversarial.

Because 93K and MTV like to argue and each has amazing typing stamina. I'll let you decide who to add to your ignore list.

Well I'm sold. In Alaska yet where the naysayers said low orbit Globalstar satcoms don't work.

https://9to5mac.com/2022/12/02/use-of-emergency-sos/

I'm glad I got my 14, I don't care what others say. Apple said
they are working on the problems and they usually fix them.

Karmutzen wrote:Well I'm sold. In Alaska yet where the naysayers said low orbit Globalstar satcoms don't work.

https://9to5mac.com/2022/12/02/use-of-emergency-sos/

Niiice