News Releases

Statement Regarding the Emergency Communications Center Call for Service Processing Error for Fire/Rescue Call on December 6, 2019

For Immediate Release: Monday, December 9, 2019

On Friday December 6, 2019, at 10:18 p.m., the Montgomery County Emergency Communications Center (911) received a call requesting assistance for smoke in the residence at 2005 Prichard Road in Wheaton.  The call-taker misunderstood the caller and entered the address as 2005 Piccard Drive in Rockville, and then continued to get further details from the caller.  Montgomery County Fire and Rescue personnel were dispatched to the Piccard Drive address while the call-taker remained on the phone.  After an additional verification of the address by the call-taker, the address was corrected to 2005 Prichard Road and Montgomery County Fire and Rescue personnel were dispatched to the Prichard Road address in Wheaton.

A timeline of the event is provided below:

Call received at ECC at 10:18 p.m. - Sent to Dispatch at 10:21 p.m.

MCFRS dispatched to 2005 Piccard Drive in Rockville at 10:21 p.m.

MCFRS arrived at Piccard Drive address at 10:25 p.m. - nothing found

Call-taker corrects address to 2005 Prichard Road at 10:25 p.m

MCFRS dispatched to Prichard Road address at 10:27 p.m.

MCFRS arrived at Prichard Road address at 10:31 p.m.

MCFRS personnel were able to neutralize a fire that had started on the 2nd floor of the residence and all residents were safely removed from the home and provided medical treatment for non-life threatening injuries.  During the call, the call-taker stayed on the phone with the caller for close to 10 minutes, obtaining additional information and providing instructions for the caller to move to a safer location.

This incident is still under review and appropriate actions will be taken to mitigate the chances of such an error occurring in the future.  We continue to work with our MCFRS partners to provide expeditious responses to incidents within Montgomery County.

###

CTJ

# # #

Release ID: 19-492
Media Contact: mcpnews 
Categories: public-statement, uncategorized