A car’s cup holders can be used for a lot of things – a coffee, of course, a convenient spot to hold change or your keys or, as emergency services are finding out, to accidentally call 911. As it turns out, on an iPhone 8 or later, an emergency call can be made by pressing down both side buttons at the same time, which is a fact of which many phone users are unaware, and which is the sort of action that’s easily triggered by squeezing your phone into that cup holder, as reported by CBC News.
Nuisance calls are a big issue for 911 operators – for operators in Red Deer, Alberta, they estimate over 20 per cent of calls to 911 are misdials, and operators in Calgary, Alberta say they get somewhere between 300 and 400 accidentally 911 calls daily, with the iPhone’s emergency call feature being a big contributor to this. “It most commonly happens when the phone is placed in a pocket, purse or cupholder,” said Magni Magnarson, deputy commander with Calgary 911, to The CBC. “It can also occur when an alarm is being silenced or someone is attempting to adjust music volumes.”
For those who do accidentally call 911, don’t immediately hang up. Says Andrea McLean, emergency dispatcher for Red Deer 911, “If you don’t answer me.… We actually have to manually call you back,” which can tie up resources needed for an actual emergency. Rather, says, McLean, “Tell us that you’re safe, and that is so much quicker for us just to have that conversation.”
Source:
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/911-cupholder-accidential-dials-1.6534289
