The lovely people at the Benton County Sheriff's Office posted a reminder this weekend that butt-dialing 9-1-1 uses essential resources. The post was made after a rash of accidental 9-1-1 calls happened.

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The post gave some insight for people to use that explains how your phone can accidentally dial emergency dispatchers without you realizing it.

Hey everyone, Lindsey in dispatch here. Today I have some information for you about the last week here in our office.
In the last week, dispatch has received 158 calls on 911 that were misdials, hang-ups or open lines with no emergency. These calls tie up resources in our office as we have to do our best to call the number back and make contact to verify there is no emergency.
How does this happen? Well, if you have an Android phone it can happen by accidentally hitting the power button 5 or more times in a row. If you have an iPhone, it can happen by holding the side button and the volume button down for a handful of seconds (this commonly happens when an iPhone is placed the cup holder of a camping chair).
If you notice you are accidentally calling 911, please stay on the line with dispatch and let us know there is no emergency, this will save us time and free us up for emergency calls that may be coming in. If you don't notice but you receive an incoming call, it might be us so please answer and let us verify that everything is okay.

158 calls over the last week! Wow!

Some things you can do to prevent accidental calls are:

  1. Lock your keypad
  2. Turn off the 911 auto dial feature (not all wireless phones have this feature)
  3. Do not program 911 into speed dial

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