“911. Where is your emergency?” is the first question someone hears after dialing for emergency help. From there, a telecommunicator, as they are called, will do everything in their power to understand the situation so they can get help to the person.
Although they are often forgotten until needed, without the telecommunicator, there is no one to answer the calls and send help when it is needed. 2020 tested the limits of the system and showed just how crucial they are to us.
“If we don’t have functional 911 centers in the state and then in the country, our entire public safety infrastructure will collapse,” said Maj. Michael Hubbs of the Marion County Sheriff’s Department. “They are truly the unsung heroes of 2020, in my opinion.”
In 2019, departments throughout Indiana received a total of 3.9 million 911 calls. In 2020, that number dropped slightly to 3.7 million due to the statewide lockdown in March and April, which caused fewer Hoosiers to leave their homes and get into accidents.
After the lockdown, calls in all counties started to increase as more and more Hoosiers returned to their normal routines. Phone calls ranged from medical emergencies to calls from people who said they were going to loot stores during the two days of instances of violence that coincided with some BLM protests that took place in downtown Indianapolis.
“It was unprecedented and just unbelievable for our dispatchers in those two days,” Hubbs said.
Now in 2021, things have almost returned to a sense of “normal.” Although the call volume has returned to levels from before the pandemic, the call centers themselves have changed. Across the country, new safety measures have been put in place to help keep telecommunicators safe. Most call centers went into their own form of a lockdown.
Typically, call centers will get multiple visitors throughout the day to thank operators, but now call centers are only allowing their staff through the doors. Staff members are required to have their temperatures taken at the door and social distance throughout the building. And they are also in charge of screening 911 callers for COVID-19 symptoms before sending help to keep first responders safe.
“We’ve actually had instances where we believe that somebody was not forthcoming with that information because they believed it would delay services and the person that needed help wouldn’t get the same type of care,” said Heath Brant, 911 executive director of the Johnson County Public Safety Communications. “You’re going to get the same level of service regardless.”
Being a 911 telecommunicator is not an easy job. They are the ones who answer emergency calls and hear everything that happens on the other line until that person hangs up as help arrives. Unlike other emergency responders, telecommunicators don’t get the closure of seeing what ends up happening on the scene, which according to Dan Henry, the government affairs director of the National Emergency Numbers Association, creates a unique kind of trauma.
“Just because they’re not on the scene doesn’t mean that they’re not going through that,” Henry said. “They have to hear all these things, and often these calls cut off before the emergency has a closure, which is a sort of unique trauma for the (telecommunicator).”
Often telecommunicators get overlooked or forgotten, but they are the vital link between public safety and the citizen, said Ed Reuter, the executive director of Indiana’s statewide 911 board who assists in taking 911 calls.
“It’s a profession we really don’t think about until we need it. And even when we need it, we’re so consumed with the emergency that we may not think about what that professional does as he or she picks up in response to that 911 caller’s call,” said NENA communications director Chris Nussman. “It’s an amazing profession. It’s a group of committed, dedicated public servants.”