Area code switch causes 911 mixups

By Rich Cholodofsky
TRIBUNE-REVIEW

Testing of Westmoreland County's 911 dispatch center revealed Friday that emergency calls from some telephone exchanges are being routed to an operator in Altoona.Public Safety Director James Corcoran said the errors were discovered yesterday afternoon and blamed the problem on Bell Atlantic, the telephone company that serves the area.

Emergency calls from selected exchanges in Penn Township, Trafford and North Huntingdon may not be sent to the dispatch center in Westmoreland County, but instead could be answered by a Bell operator in Altoona. Corcoran could not identify the exact exchanges affected by the glitch, but said the numbers appear to be identical to Allegheny County exchanges in Monroeville, Turtle Creek and McKeesport.

About 3,500 telephones in Westmoreland County share exchanges with those Allegheny County numbers and could be affected by the routing errors, but so far only two problems have surfaced. "Bell tells us they are trying to fix it, but it's something that is in the system that we can't fix," Corcoran said.

Corcoran said there is nothing local emergency crews can do about the problem because it involves internal area code routing done by the telephone company. The problem is related to the lack of a consolidated 911 system in Allegheny County. Plans are on track to put Allegheny on line with a centralized 911 system later this year, but in communities without current access to the system, 911 calls are sent to Bell operators.

Debbi Palmieri, a 911 service manager for Bell Atlantic, said the problem could be human error. Palmieri said that because some telephone exchanges are shared between two counties, the numbers were manually inserted into the routing system. "Nothing is broke and the problems are being fixed," Palmieri said.

Workers will spend the next several days verifying that all emergency calls from Westmoreland County are forwarded to the dispatch center in Greensburg. It was the switch this month to the 724 area code that led to Westmoreland County officials discovering the routing problems.

Tests on the 911 system were conducted immediately after the switch, and no problems were discovered. Tests were again conducted yesterday afternoon and officials found that some calls were being sent to central Pennsylvania.

Corcoran said anyone in the affected area should still dial 911 in an emergency. Most calls will get through to the dispatch center in Greensburg, Corcoran said.

The calls that are routed to Altoona will be transferred back to Greensburg with only a short delay in service.

Return to News ... This search section will enable you to find specific information on the TRIButaries Internet edition of the Tribune-Review.