A police force in the Greater Toronto Area is sounding the alarm over a high volume of pocket dials and other nuisance 911 calls this year.
So far in 2017, the York Regional Police Communication Centre has received 15,172 accidental calls from mobile devices — about 18 per cent of the total number of 911 calls for the period, police said Wednesday.
“For every unintentional call or pocket dial received, an emergency communicator must determine whether an emergency exists,” York police said in a press release. “Every second counts when someone is waiting for an emergency communicator to pick up an emergency call and dispatch police, fire and paramedics.”
Police said pocket dials can be prevented by locking the keypad when the device isn’t in use, disabling 911 auto-dial features and not allowing small children to play with phones — even inactive ones.
Police released the audio of two calls where children had inadvertently called 911. In one case, the child was able to reach 911 on an iPhone that did not have a SIM card.
York police said anyone who accidentally calls 911 should stay on the line and explain the error to prevent the operator from having to call back.
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