MANCHESTER, Vt. (WCAX) – Authorities in southern Vermont are hoping residents will embrace a new app that is designed to help first responders find people in need, faster.
Tom Best, with the Manchester Dispatch Center, has worked as a dispatcher for both state and local police departments for over two decades. He says while dispatchers and first responders already have many addresses they can look up, his center is now using the app What3Words to locate emergencies that happen where no physical address exists.
“We currently have 911 addresses which cover the whole state of Vermont, but this would be used in areas where there’s not addresses, mountains, mountains where you’re hiking, hunting, lakes, fishing — where you wouldn’t know exactly where you were,” Best said. “It’s very user-friendly, anyone can pull the app up and figure it out without any instructions.”
The app syncs to the department’s current technology, allowing them to share the three words with first responders who have access to the app, instead of a 911 address or long coordinates. “You would be able to go to the person needing help the same it would just be a quicker and more accurate way of doing it,” Best said.
Best says they haven’t had anyone use the app for rescue yet, but they’ll be prepared for the day when it happens.