Police to revisit
911 procedures
PHILIPSBURG--Police Chief Commissioner of the Windward Islands Derrick Holiday says police management will look at the 911 emergency hotlines with United Telecommunication Services (UTS), TelEm and Zenitel once again to obtain additional technical advice on how to optimise the use of the emergency number.
Holiday’s comments came on the heels of allegations that several unanswered calls had been made to the 911 emergency hotline when the Matser complex at Gumbs Drive #21 in Middle Region went up in flames Saturday night.
The unanswered calls allegedly resulted in the Fire Department receiving late notice of the fire, causing fire fighters to arrive at the scene some 30 minutes after the alarm had been raised.
That late response was compounded by an inadequate supply of water at a reasonable pressure to fight the fire, which was some 500 metres uphill from the nearest functioning fire hydrant.
“I have requested that the facts surrounding the incident be gathered and delivered to my desk, at which point I will offer a reaction based on the findings. What I will not do though is throw blame at any other department, as playing the blame game will not solve the problem,” Holiday told The Daily Herald Monday.
He said he sympathised with the family on their loss. “We indeed intend to look at our own internal system of responding to the 911 emergency number, with three key companies responsible for its operation,” he said.
He did not say whether there had been problems in the past, but said police management had their own ideas on how they thought the system should work. This will be discussed during the meeting with the three companies.
