Boy’s death sparks call for VoIP 911 upgrade
p2pnet news view | Mobiles:- Following the tragic death of a little boy in Calgary, Alberta, after his parents’ VoIP 911 went to the wrong city, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission wants to create a database that would match the home address of those calling over Net phones by linking it to the caller’s IP address.
“The plan is welcome news to the family of Elijah Luck, the Calgary toddler who died almost a year ago after the emergency call centre contracted by Comwave, the family’s voice over Internet Protocol company, dispatched an ambulance to their former home in Ontario,” says the Canwest News Service.
Comwave had said it was, “the family’s responsibility to update their 911 address with the company,” says the story. The Lucks had only changed their billing address.
The Lucks waited for almost half an hour for an ambulance to arrive, finally asking a neighbour to call the emergency phone number from his land line.
Last year, the CRTC found call takers at the 911 call centre contracted by Comwave failed to follow regulations when dealing with an emergency call from the Luck family in April, says Canwest, adding:
“The commission still has to determine the cost of such a measure and who should pay to implement it.”
wrong city – Toddler dies after VoIP 911 failure, May 2, 2008
Canwest News Service – CRTC calls for 911 system upgrades for Internet calls, April 19, 2009
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