Texting 911

911 has become an almost universal phone service number where everyone know what it means. If you’re ever caught in a situation where you want to dial 911 but don’t want an intruder to hear you, a feature that will be live next week could save your life. America’s four largest carriers — AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint and Verizon — will support Text-to-911 starting May 15 to provide a helpful option for those caught in dangerous circumstances. While a Text-to-911 program has been around since as early as 2011, the feature was only available on a limited basis in a few markets such as Los Angeles, Iowa, Maryland, Durham and Vermont. The FCC announced a proposed rule to make this service uniformly available via all text providers by Dec 30, 2014. Why hasn't this service been available earlier? It seems like common sense with much of the conversation going on being in the form of texting to be able to text 911. It would be interesting to see some of the cases where the texting was used and proved to be effective.