Location and Personalisation: Delivering Online and Mobility Services
This book takes a look at two application technologies location and personalization and presents an understanding of the technical and business impact of these technologies.
TABLE OF CONTENTS Location and Personalisation: Delivering Online and Mobility Services
Chapter 3: Locating Calls to the Emergency Services
P H Salmon
3.1 Introduction
Provision of emergency services varies widely between countries since they have evolved to meet national needs and have not had any good reason to harmonise with other countries. In some countries, for instance, fire service personnel also act as paramedics. Unsurprisingly, the emergency telephone numbers vary between countries. Some countries have one number for all services while others have separate numbers for each service and these can be different again in separate regions within a country. Often, sections of the population of a country are not aware of what number they should call in an emergency. A visitor to a foreign country is even less likely to know the correct numbers. The EU has selected 112 as the emergency services number for the EU countries. Concerns were expressed about using a low number as line noise can generate false calls of numbers with 1s and 2s in them. Though 112 is available in most European countries, there is little public awareness of it. A survey showed that many Europeans were more aware of the American 911 because of the TV programme Emergency 911. Once a call has been received by the emergency services it is important that help is despatched as soon as possible to the incident location.
3.2 The Importance of Location in Emergencies
In an emergency situation people are often confused and, in panic, unable to say where they are calling from. Time spent on determining the caller's location leads to delay...
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