Making emergency calls in rural areas can sometimes be a struggle, but Jason Fritz, deputy director of 911 operations for Clark Regional Emergency Services Agency (CRESA), said residents can still reach 911 in case of an emergency if internet or cell service is down.
When it comes to emergency calls being made in Clark County, Fritz said the landline call volume is roughly 7% of the total calls. That percentage includes both wired and internet-based phone calls that come into the CRESA 911 dispatch center.
“It’s hard sometimes, especially when you have a carrier that’s providing both your internet service and your phone service [because], most likely, if they go down, everything’s down, and it’s hard in those rural areas,” Fritz said. “I live in a rural area myself.”
An option Fritz suggested, if one can afford it, would be to consider a second internet service provider. In rural areas, a second internet service provider may come in the form of a satellite. He mentioned if the option for a wired internet service is available, callers should make sure they’re not connected with the current provider to avoid a double outage.
Fritz said users of T-Mobile and AT&T are in luck as new technology will soon hit the market. T-Mobile has partnered with SpaceX while AT&T partnered with AST SpaceMobile to bring satellite-driven cellular services to the United States. The low-orbit satellites are able to bring cell service to most places in the United States, Fritz said.
“So, your cell phone, if it was not able to get cell service, it would connect to these low orbiting satellites, and they’re basically saying that anywhere you’re at, you could get cell service,” Fritz said. “So that’s certainly a technology folks might want to look at.”
Another way to contact emergency services, if the situation allows, would be to drive to the nearest fire station — unstaffed ones, Fritz said. He added that an unstaffed fire station may have a call box to reach a staffed station, a specific firefighter or some other option.
With internet providers having consistent outages in rural America, Fritz understands the need for rural communities to have all options available to reach first responders.
“There is the fight for making sure that our rural communities have the technology they need to be able to certainly access emergency services, as well as just do their day-to-day jobs and operations that they do,” Fritz said.
He also said CRESA will hire 12 call takers and dispatchers this year in order to improve service for callers and user-agencies, and the agency plans to expand that more in 2025.
“We have two academies coming up to fill both call taking and dispatching,” Fritz said.
The hiring of 12 additional call takers and dispatchers will shorten wait times for non-emergency and emergency calls, Fritz said.
“We have a large non-emergency call volume, as well,” He said. “That’s almost half of our call volume.”
CRESA handled over half a million calls in 2023, Fritz said, with 70% of those being law enforcement related and the rest fire and EMS related. He said non-emergency 311 calls made up roughly 40% of the total call volume in 2023.
“CRESA is always looking to improve our services and enhance the customer service that we have,” Fritz said. “We are always trying to look at ways to be more efficient and utilize the technologies that are out there to provide the best 911 service and emergency management services for the citizens of Clark County.”
