911: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO)

nine-one-one you know the thing you call right after WebMD tells you you're not going to be able to get it out on your own nine-one-one is a number so important we do everything to make kids remember it from classroom posters to toy phones to folksy PSAs produced by local fire houses hi mrs. Clarke welcome to station four so who knows when to call 9-1-1 you should call 9-1-1 if a person is badly hurt or in danger right now if you're not sure whether it's a real emergency and there are no adults around it's a good idea to make the call now that's true but sometimes you should call even if adults are around for instance if someone's dying and the only adult is Matthew McConaughey maybe don't leave the decision to him oh you're bleeding out there Hoss all right tell you what to do let's get some bongo drums and a bit of horrible love and tell that open wound to come together harm bro we got it done we make roughly 240 million 911 calls each year and the dispatchers do amazing work talking people through childbirth CPR abductions and home break-ins in fact we're so accustomed to relying on them we even call when we don't have an emergency nine month where is your emergency I'm sorry but I the fireworks bill on I'm sorry you cannot call 911 so bad you're welcome I think I'm having an overdose and so is my wife we made brownies and I think we're dead time is going by really really really really slow I guess I'm calling because I have a baby lizard in my house and I loud in my arm printer the baby crawled in your printer no a baby lizard Oh a lizard where your emergency come on that's a little boy named Richie hey you're done paddy oh you're done party okay now okay now I know I know that sounds adorable but that kid might have caused such a mess in that bathroom he had to call 9-1-1 uh yeah this is Richie you guys have some sort of emergency cleanup crew you can send out cuz I am done going potty we have a lot of faith in 9-1-1 but the system can break down more than you think and when it does people can die as a result chanel Anderson was delivering newspapers in the dark in suburban Atlanta when she careened into this pond she knew right where she was I don't have that but 9-1-1 dispatchers can't find her on their map it took first responders nearly 20 minutes to get to her she died because a system we expect to save our lives failed her and 911 losing valuable time simply because dispatchers have trouble determining your location is not unusual the FCC estimates improving location accuracy could save over 10,000 lives a year which seems like a worthwhile goal people making emergency calls are on the very short list of things we expect to be found 100% of the time it's that the clitoris and Nemo these is not a bad fish it's not a bad fish he's just curious and he's capable of more than you think and the obstacles for 9-1-1 centers don't stop there depending on where you live they may also be underfunded understaffed and full of outdated technology which is fine if you're describing a radio shack but it's a little scary when you're describing a place that handles life-and-death situations so tonight let's focus on how on earth we got to this point now the location problems have a lot to do with the fact that 70 to 80% of all 9-1-1 calls now come from cellphones and that's become a problem when everyone used landlines they could simply match the call to your billing address and know exactly where you were but now you could be anywhere and of course you have AT&T because then you can only get reception standing on a chair right by your livingroom window as long as it's not cloudy and while no one wants enters do get some location info from wireless carriers it varies wildly sometimes they might only get the cell tower your call was routed through and that's why around the country your chance of them quickly getting your exact whereabouts ranges from as low as 10% to as high as 95% just watch one reporter put a dispatch center in Virginia to the test hi this is Jeff Rossen with NBC News just want to know if you can tell me where our location is on your computer that's not here absolutely not that's about a quarter mile away and we're standing in the actual 9-1-1 center that's it right down there oh that is not good you never want to be in a situation where you have to tell someone I'm actually inside you right now and if you're thinking if you're thinking well hold on wait a minute I can find my location on my cell phone well you're not alone dispatchers wonder the same thing I can check in on Facebook and it'll tell you exactly what building I'm in I can be at the hockey game and it tells them at First Niagara Center checking in on Facebook but when you call 911 we don't get that accurate location information so the technology is out there it's just not getting tossed at this point that's a good point because even the Domino's app can tell where you are and they've barely mastered the technology to make a palatable pizza so we asked everyone from the FCC to public safety groups to industry trade groups about why it seems lubbers can find you better than ambulances can and there doesn't seem to be a simple satisfying answer broadly what we were told while services like uber aren't always 100% accurate either particularly in rural areas plus emergency workers would like technology that can tell them what floor of a building you're on and no one seems to know how to do that yet and while the wireless industry does claim to be working toward incorporating some of what uber uses into 9-1-1 location services it seems there is no guarantee when that will be ready for widespread use what we do know is that the FCC has mandated they improve accuracy so that by 2021 carriers deliver a usable location for callers 80% of the time which sounds impressive until you put it like this six years from now 9/11 could still be unable to find one out of every five emergency callers that's not good enough the sentence in six years I might not be able to find one out of five of you is only acceptable if you're speaking to the members of one direction and I'm sorry Niall but one of you has to be the JC chasse and and look fixing the location problem won't fix everything 911 is so fragmented there are currently five thousand eight hundred and ninety nine dispatch centers because each county or municipality in an area might have its own one plus there is no guarantee that any two dispatch centers use the same technology or have a system to work together and none of this is helped by the fact that in six states there is no specific statewide entity in charge of coordinating 9-1-1 services and while Georgia law does require an actual committee to help develop plans for 9-1-1 it's not exactly a robust body this is it Georgia's permanent 911 committee you'll notice all 15 seats are empty there's no one at the mic and there's nothing on the agenda this committee hasn't met for years because there isn't a single member currently appointed how the is that possible we even asked and a spokesperson claimed that that committee does actually have members but couldn't confirm it's active and didn't answer when we asked for those members names and come on you can at least make up a name like I don't know John Miller right off the top of your head it's clearly not and there is a lot that that committee could be doing for instance for over a decade the federal government has been talking about something called next generation 9 1 1 basically upgrading dispatch centers to an ip-based network and enabling them to do things like accept videos and text messages and that could be life-saving in situations where you can't make a phone call like domestic violence or a home invasion or having a heart attack in a library I mean sure get some help but have some respects for the other patrons but as of right now no state has fully implemented next-gen 9-1-1 which makes no sense this would make everything so much easier for the dispatchers whose jobs are frankly hard enough already some days depending upon the outcome it's good other days not sometimes you really don't know the outcome and you go home at night and you wonder is it something I could have done that would have prevented maybe this person from dying or this person from getting hurt and then there are other times when you might save a life that you go home and you you know you pat yourself on the back you're driving home and you you cut the music up and you're saying to yourself why I did something really good ok I mean that is a wider extreme the most of experience in our daily jobs for me the difference between a good day and a bad day is whether there's hazelnut creamer in the break room or whether Janice from accounting drank it all again god damn it Janice that's not even milk that's disgusting and that level of stress combined with funding shortages has caused dispatch centers to be understaffed in fact right now go to Google put in understaffed 9-1-1 dispatch and your town and see what comes up because in many places it will be headlines like these it seems 9-1-1 staffing problems one of those things a ridiculous number of cities have like a chinatown or a statue of someone racist and and if your local dispatch center is understaffed then when you call the first voice you hear maybe this separates Memphis 9-1-1 emergency all operators are busy so please remain on the line you've reached the cincinnati 9-1-1 center your call will be answered as soon as possible you have reached New Hanover County 911 experiencing high volumes of emergency calls you have reached 9-1-1 emergency dispatch do not hang up it's in danger lay down the phone and go to safety oh go to safety why didn't I think of that Here I am in danger when really I could simply be going to safety I shouldn't have wasted your time by calling in the first place and some of that call volume is on us the ubiquity of cell phones means if 50 people see a fire 9-1-1 might get 50 calls and that's on top of an even bigger strain on the system approximately 84 million 911 ation wide are but dials one person even but dial nine-one-one 136 times when you receive a call and it's from as we call the the but dial there's really not a whole lot you can do when I tell that but dial them they always sound kind of aggravated I mean it's kind of a waste of their time you know okay make sure you don't call again okay honestly I'm willing to bet that guy hears the same response from just about anyone he dials by accident or on purpose so look we have an antiquated disjointed system populated by workers who are understandably sick of listening to people's butts and what makes this even more frustrating is that almost everyone's phone bill has a line like this on it which you might assume goes directly to fund 9-1-1 centers but but the FCC's fee reports show that since 2008 at least 20 states have diverted those dollars elsewhere which is probably why depending on where you live 9-1-1 may be a joke in your town to quotes duran duran I mean I know it's a Public Enemy song but did you know that Juran georan covered it you're welcome because you haven't heard that disaffected anthem properly until you've had it performed by a white man named Simon from Hartford sheer the point is we are routinely raiding 911 to pay for other things New York State which has seen multiple breakdowns in its 9-1-1 systems took in over a hundred and eighty five million dollars in fees in 2014 but then diverted 77 million into the state's general fund where it could be spent on pretty much anything and yet when the governor was asked about this he blew it off is that something in the budget process that you'll take a look at is it right for us to divert this money it is not an issue that has come up and I haven't heard any local legislature raise it but if it comes up and look into it okay.i it just king came up the legislators have raised the issue repeatedly since you've been in office and see not diverting money away from 911 is one of those things you shouldn't have to be told not to do like softening gas out of a fire truck to put in your dirt bike oh no one's told me this is wrong so if you'll excuse me I'm gonna spin some dough locks in that Arby's parking lot but this blasé attitude is indicative of the fact that until we're explicitly confronted with the challenges facing 9-1-1 it seems we're not going to do anything about them and maybe the problem is that we are taught from a young age to take 9-1-1 for granted so perhaps it's time for that to change so you should call 911 is badly hurt or in danger any questions yeah so if I called I what what don't come and help me well I'm sure gonna try sweetie but I gotta be honest if you're calling from a cell phone and you don't know your address a lot of the time we're gonna struggle to find out exactly where you are that's scary well don't you worry by the Year 2021 we will find you every time four out of five times wait how can you not know how to find me I can order pizza from my phone right now and they know exactly where I am it's not the same thing I just did it there's a pizza on sway you know what I'm gonna get a dispatcher to come explain this to you hey kids firefighter bill said you had some questions about why we're not able to find you all the time yeah why is that well we just don't have the technology to pizzas here get out on the bright side some places have pretty good statewide systems like Maine hey my grandma lives in Maine well then she should be fine my panda lives at Georgia who she is totally why don't you guys just try harder excuse me oh you think I don't try hard I just worked a 12-hour shift I hope deliver three babies I saved a family from a fire I pulled a lizard out of a printer and I listened to 15 different but oh yeah well we'll see how hard you're laughing when I'm listening to someone's ass and you're all burning to death in your beds it's so hard to flame the lick in my body okay who wants to pet a Dalmatian nine-one-one we'll be there when you need us some restrictions apply availability may be limited offer not guaranteed in all states actual response time may vary contact a medical professional if you experience awake time longer than four hours you

Channel: LastWeekTonight

Views: 11,128,825

Rating: 4.8839211 out of 5

Keywords: last week tonight with john oliver, john oliver, 911, john oliver 911

Id: A-XlyB_QQYs

Length: 15min 57sec (957 seconds)

Published: Sun May 15 2016

Reddit Comments

[u/farhadJuve]

When I was a foreign exchange student (15 at the time) in Texas I got so freaked out when i missed my school bus on the day of the test that I decided for some reason call 911. the amazing part is that they did send a car and 2 cops dropped me off at school! Now when I think about it, I feel terrible for wasting their time, but at the time I was convinced that me missing a test was an emergency. They were super nice, though

[u/SteamPunkerest]

911 dispatcher here. Can confirm that what he said is true. Much of it applies to the center where I work. But with that said, I'd put my life and the lives of my wife and kids in the hands of any of my coworkers.

[u/OathOfFeanor]

Here's the problem.

Look at all the examples they gave of companies that know where you are: Dominos, Facebook, etc. What do they have in common? An app on your phone. The app is where they get access to the GPS data.

When you place a phone call, you can't include all the same information. Phone calls are archaic technology. Metadata wasn't even a thing when the PSTN was built.

So the only way 911 could do this is with an app. But have you ever had an app on your phone freeze, and you had to close the app and re-launch it? What happens if you're trying to get ahold of 911 when that happens?

Not only that, but does every jurisdiction then need a different 911 app? What if you launch the wrong one when you're on vacation in the city 2 hours away? That won't work, so now they have to create a server infrastructure across the entire country that intelligently routes 911 app submissions to the appropriate dispatch location. It's not impossible but it's a MAJOR undertaking. And you saw how well the Obamacare website went.

[u/TheOldestBanana]

How do you even justify diverting money from something as important as emergency response?

[u/Lanowar]

Dailymotion Mirror for us Non Americans

[u/raeser]

Some solutions exist to help with this issue, for example Australia has an app called Emergency+ which will show you (the caller) your location and address so you can read it out to the operator www.triplezero.gov.au/Pages/EmergencySmartphoneApp.aspx

A similar app is coming to the UK http://www.wireless-mag.com/News/40887/uk%E2%80%99s-first-nextgen-999-mobile-app-gets-government-approval.aspx

[u/CHARLIE_CANT_READ]

Stuff like this is what made me originally become a fan of the show. Semi in-depth pieces on random problems that nobody knowns about but everyone can agree is a problem.

[u/gonnaupvote4]

This is interesting, how will people react to the city having the technology to track exactly where you are when they want?

[u/danimalod]

That was just about the worst Matthew Mcconaughey impression I've ever heard.