By Julie Turkewitz
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Copyright 2006 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
An eight-and-a-half hour computer system failure at Atlanta’s only 911 center late Thursday night did not delay emergency services, officials said Friday.
A power surge caused the computer dispatch system to crash about 10:30 p.m., said Maj. Stan Savage at the Atlanta Police Department. The system’s back-up batteries also failed. Some phones were affected, but calls from the public were not slowed.
Dispatchers at the center use the computer system to input caller information and quickly identify the nearest fire station and emergency medical service.
Operators switched to a manual system — writing down names of callers, using map books and contacting emergency services by radio — to get help where it was needed, said Capt. Byron Kennedy at the Atlanta Fire Department.
"[The computer system] just supplements what we already do, it makes things easier and streamlines the process,” he said. “We still got there in our normal three to four minute time.”
Call volume at the center, which serves the entire city of Atlanta, was typical during the outage, Kennedy said. The call center typically fields 2,800 a day for police and about 30 calls for the fire department on a fair weather night, he said.
The cause of the surge remains under investigation.
There is a chance lightning hit the battery system, Savage said.
Georgia Power technicians restored the system by 7 a.m. Friday.
The shutdown, said Savage, emphasizes the need for all 911 call centers to have manual back-up plans.
“The bottom line is that if someone calls 911, they don’t care if we have a computer system or use the caveman approach and write it all down,” he said, “as long as we get there.”