I received a Reverse 911 call

I received a "Reverse 911" call this afternoon. The caller ID showed 999-999-9999, and when I picked it up, the recorded message was:
"This is an urgent message from the _________ Police Department".

It went on to describe a 6 year old boy that had gone missing about 1:15 this afternoon, and asked people to be on the lookout for him.

The local 5PM news described this as a "Reverse 911" call, and said it was made to all residents within a 5 mile radius of the town.

The story turns out happily. The brat - new to the area - skipped out of school and was found rowing a boat in a nearby pond.

The PD has a good idea with this new type of call. The boy couldn't swim, btw, and a man recognized the boat as his neighbor's, and the boy from the phone call.

[edit on 28-9-2006 by jsobecky]

We've had these for about two years now where I live, everything from alerting a neighborhood to a crime spree so we know what's going on and can keep our eyes open, to water boiling alerts (burst main), etc.

They can be very effective and a really good reason to make sure you have E911 in place, especially with an internet phone line. (It's not a given with all of the internet phone service providers.)

Originally posted by Relentless
They can be very effective and a really good reason to make sure you have E911 in place, especially with an internet phone line. (It's not a given with all of the internet phone service providers.)

That's an excellent point and one worth repeating often. I was surprised to hear that some isp's don't automatically supply E911 in areas where it is available.

I'm pretty sure what you got was an Amber alert.

The Origin of the Amber Plan

The AMBER Plan was created in 1996 as a powerful legacy to 9-year-old Amber Hagerman, a bright little girl who was kidnapped and brutally murdered while riding her bicycle in Arlington, Texas. The tragedy shocked and outraged the entire community. Residents contacted radio stations in the Dallas area and suggested they broadcast special “alerts” over the airwaves so that they could help prevent such incidents in the future.

In response to the community’s concern for the safety of local children, the Dallas/Fort Worth Association of Radio Managers teamed up with local law-enforcement agencies in northern Texas and developed this innovative early warning system to help find abducted children. Statistics show that, when abducted, a child’s greatest enemy is time.

In April, 2003, President Bush signed the Amber Alert legislation making it a national program. While the Amber Alert system is now mandated across the country, some states are still trying to implement the procedures necessary in bringing the alerts to the public. Hampered by outdated Emergency Broadcast guidelines and different activation criteria in each state, the system needs a fair amount of fine-tuning to be optimally effective. Code Amber is on the cutting edge with the technology helping to make that a reality.

codeamber.org...

You can subscribe and get Amber Alerts on your mobile as well.

I get them on my Blackberry, but it's also part of what i do, yet one never knows. You just might see a vehicle or something that comes across with the alert and manage to save a child.

Semper