Local

Cell tower quirk could send your 911 call far away

If you call 911 from a cellphone, it might not go to a dispatch center near you.

Pawnee County resident Donna Larson learned that lesson the hard way, when she suffered a bad cut on her leg, called 911 from her cellphone, and says she was told by the dispatcher that she was outside their area and they didn't know who she should call.

"What is my emergency number if it's not 911...?" Larson said she asked the dispatcher.  "And she said I have no idea, and that ticked me off."

Larson later found out that apparently, because of the way cell phone towers work, sometimes your call to 911 will get diverted to a dispatch center out of town, or even out of STATE.

She now has the full number for the nearest ambulance service programmed into her cell phone.

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