ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. — WFTV found out Orange County's 911 system has been crashing, so now the county is making an emergency upgrade. The system is only four years old and originally cost taxpayers nearly $4 million.
In October, the county's busiest call facility for the Orange County Sheriff's Office and Fire Rescue had a severe failure. A few months later, the same thing happened at the Winter Park call center.
"In both cases the server suffered some type of failure and did not revert to its onsite back-up," said Orange County 911 analyst Jeff Ballard.
With a rollover system, the county did not lose any 911 calls, but still called the system failures serious.
"It's critical items get resolved as soon as possible," Ballard said.
There is also a problem with the speed of the software. If a caller dials 911 and hangs up right away, the caller's number may not immediately show up for the dispatcher to call back.
"We have to go through a different protocol to trace the call then, and that of course takes more time. Of course time in our business could mean lives," Ballard said.
The county's also had problems with getting accurate records on their calls.
All of these problems need to be fixed before June 1.
"We have six months basically of the year and that's not available to us because of hurricane season," Ballard explained.
The county said none of its call centers will ever be out of service during the upgrade.
The massive project is projected to begin in May.
WFTV
