ECN Forum Forums General Topics of the Trade Non-US Electrical Systems & Trades You wouldn't believe it!

Sounds rather strange, as calls to emergency numbers from overseas are usually barred (not always though, especially where alternate carriers are involved).

Captain Pugwash is an old cartoon character from children's TV.


[This message has been edited by pauluk (edited 10-04-2003).]

Steve,

Do you think this recording might be a way to deter the nuisance callers and get the call volume down?!

Paul,
So that's who Capt. Pugwash is!.
I would never have known, thanks for the link, mate!.
Just mucking around on the CAD system at the moment, things are pretty quiet at the moment, phone has been dead since 0200.
Just as a note, I have 2 screens before me, both LCD's 19", one has Line CAD on it, the other has Internet Explorer on it, this is the one that I am communicating with you on at the moment, but the thing is, I aren't typing, it's all through Voice Recognition!.
If the Boss could see me sitting up here with a un-healthily strong coffee and a Steak and Cheese pie(potato-topped too!), he'd have a fit!.
Life is sweet!

The 999 service here apparently gets calls from overseas occasionally.

You can dial it simply by using it as if it were a local number. i.e. international codes followed by a valid area code followed by 999.

I have no idea why it's not barred from abroad.

Although bear in mind that caller ID from any country with a digital phone system cannot be hidden from 999 as it ignores the do not display flag and gives the operator your number. Also, all calls are recorded.

So call from australia and expect to have eircom call telstra !

In fairness to 999 / 112 in Ireland I have had to use them in genuine emergencies twice and they answered immediately.. no ring just dialled 999 and got Emergency .. which service please?

Also 112 works from any mobile phone by just grabbing the strongest signal regardless of your network. Even if you don't have a sim inserted or if the phone is locked it will over-ride the key lock if you dial 112 send.
Modern PABXs here anyway also must route 999 and 112 directly without the need for extra digits / codes.

Trumpy — Don’t forget in IE surfing that internet "trails" on various servers may still be around 100 years from now. The concept of telephone-conversation privacy does not apply to digital forms of communication, especially at work.

One minor comment about false/pointless emergency calls… there is discussion on the web that at some point in US history {Boston?—1800s?} bogus fire alarms were such a problem that an alarm box was invented that, when triggered, would lock the user's hand internally until a special key from the reporting fire brigade would release it.




[This message has been edited by Bjarney (edited 10-04-2003).]

Same here. Some years ago it used to be a standing joke about dialing 192 (directory enquiries) and falling asleep while waiting for an answer, but the few times I've had to call 999 the answer has always been almost instantaneous.

These days there are special emergency service centers, but in the "old" system up to the 1980s dialing 999 in most places routed the call to the same operator positions as if you dialed 100 for a regular operator.

On the old switchboards, regular 100 calls came in with a white call indicator lamp while 999 came in on circuits which flashed a red light. Emergency calls also flashed a large red light (standard lamp, 100W) atop the boards and sounded a klaxon until answered.