Geico266

Just seems to me that if you mobilized 50 volunteer firemen in 4 wheel drive vehicles they could have combed 50 square miles in minutes. It took them 4 hours to find their shelter, and by then had left and were dead. -20F windchill is nothing to mess around with.

I understand what you are saying about them drinking. Probably so, more than likely. But when they called 911 they were alive and needed immediate help and they did not get it. The first time the cops went to where they thought they were, and they were not there, they should have declaired an emergency search and recue operation and called in every volunteer fireman with 50 miles. That would have mobilized about 200 fireman.

Even if they were drunk, the dispatcher should have figured out this was a life and death situation. 2 souls outside in -20 windchill without proper clothes = 3 hours to live. The dispatcher should have called up more help. That is why the people volunteer for fireservice. To protect, serve, and save lives. Get the people moving in the direction of the trouble. You can always tell them they found them and send them home. It costs very little, and could have saved 2 lives.

It just makes me sick to think of them dying without a proper search & rescue being called for until they were dead.

If I crashed my plane and didn't know where I was and I called 911, you can bet they would mount a huge search and rescue effort, thats all I'm saying. Because they were young kids, who got stuck in a snow storm and they left the truck, they did not get the proper attention to their life and death situation needed to save their lives.

tpuig

Really a shame. We should all be prepared as mentioned.

When travelling to a snowy region there are cold weather supplies in the toolbox. I've got a nice first aid kit and a couple MRE's that are under the back seat all the time, along with a poncho liner. Guess if I got stuck and lost, I'd wait until daylight and light the spare tire on fire ( a safe distance from the truck, of course) The EPA would probably be there in minutes to fine me...
TP

Lil Dog

Considering the latest "lockdown" on EPA equipment here on the forums, that is funnier every time I read it.

J-eh

wagontrain131

I am a 911 dispatcher. I dont know the whole story but, what makes you think that the firemen were not already out on other calls? Do you honestly think that that was the only 911 call that dispatcher recieved that night for help? Cell phones in most locations in the country cannot be tracked, even nextel units with GPS. At my 911 screen, when I get a 911 call I get the location of the cell tower that the cell phone is hitting and a call back number, and thats it. That is just about useless because a single cell tower covers alot of ground. That is what you they call phase one technology. Phase one technology is supose to give 911 dispatchers the phone number of the cell phone calling and the cell phone tower address that the cell phone call is hitting. 90-95% on the 911 centers in the country are phase one compliant. Phase two technology is supose to give the GPS coordinates of the cell phone to the 911 dispatcher. In most cases that is accurate to within 100 meters. The problem with Phase two technology is that not all cell phone companys have completed the upgrades, most 911 centers are not Phase 2 compliant , and most cell phones are older and dont have GPS technology. There is also Phase three. That will give the location of the cell phone on a map right in front of the dispatcher, but that is a long way off. The 911 center that recieved that call may have been Phase two compliant, the 911 dispatcher my have had the GPS location of the caller, and the voluteer fire service in the area may have been doing absolutely nothing, but most likely that was not the case. More than likely the 911 center was NOT Phase two compliant , the 911 dispatcher did NOT have the location of the caller or the caller Had a older cell phone, and the fire department was probally busy. So dont blame the 911 dispatcher. If you want to blame someone,blame the kids for getting out in that weather anyway, blame the government for not holding the cell phone companys feet to the fire and getting this technology in place, or blame the local government for not having Phase two technology or not if they did. Anyways it was a bad situation on a bad night, that even if all of the new technology was in place would not have made a differnece. If one 4 wheel drive got stuck in the snow, other 4 wheel drives would have gotten stuck in snow, even the fire departments. Just my 2 cents


Kyle

natstayl

I don't presume to know how bad it can get in Nebraska. In addition to 911, who else did the young people call? Didn't they call mom/dad? What did Mom&Dad tell them to do? Most dads would tell our kids to stay/return to the truck, then we would call a couple of other 4x4 owners preferably with CB radios and start a search. and if the danger merits it ask the sherriff to get the National Guard involved with bigger 4x4's.
Nat
On edit, I just read this from their newspaper archives,
"Mr. Wamsley called 911 shortly before 2 a.m. CST Wednesday saying he and Ms. Hornickel were lost, London said. A desperate ground and air search for the two ensued that included members of the Sarpy County sheriff's office, Omaha police, the Nebraska State Patrol, rescue dogs and about 30 members of the Nebraska National Guard."
Another archive goes on to tell the truck was not near the road, and only the newest cellphone technology could have helped locate the teens and without it, they were hopelessly lost since the teens could not tell anyone where they were so I guess Dad and his posse couldn't have found them in time either.

Geico266

Something is out of order in the story you quoted. Only the governor can call out the National Guard, and they were called out four days after they last called 911. There could not have been an air search that night due to weather. There were no other fire calls in the Gretna area that night, so there were at least 200 firemen with vehicles were sitting and not being utilized for the search until it was too late. They could have searched dozens of square miles and possible found them. I'm confident we could have done better.

An investigation needs to be conducted to see if everything was done to save these two lives. I'm sure the 911 operator followed proper proceedures, but I'll bet the proceedures are not the BEST they can be. In the year 2005 with all of the technology we have 2 people got lost and froze to death is hard to understand.

natstayl

I had some questions about that news archive myself especially the air search. I don't know how it works in Nebraska, but friends in the guard are always ready to raid the armory around here if the need merits it, so I presumed they got involved before the governor.
I see your point.
Let me ask one more question, how could the volunteers hope to find them if they weren't where they said they were? Apparently the boy left the road to 4wheel at the gravel/sand pits, is that what happened?
Nat

Hoss

How do you know there wasn't a search and rescue team looking for them? As you said, they probably only had about three hours to live. Even with a thousand people, you could cover a LOT of ground in three hours and STILL not find them....especially if they're buried in snow like the girl was.

I'm not really taking sides here, but I also don't think that the blame should be laid on authorities. You can't save everyone.

Geico266

You start a grid search expanding from the area where they said they were. Lights and sirens for 1-2 miles then shut them off and stop and listen for people call out. In this case they could have called 911 back and said they heard the sirens or saw lights. All this can be coordinated through the raidios in the firetrucks. As I understand it, during the initial hours of the search they only called in 2 squad cars with 2 wheel drive. IMHO the 911 operator or sheriff should have recongnized this as a life and death situation and called for a full scale search & rescue operation.

Is this Monday morning quarterbacking? Yes, but two college kids are dead and we need to ask why and how to avoid it in the future. It nearly happened again 2 weeks later. It took authorities here 4 hours to find an 80 year old woman who got lost and stuck.

I'm not looking for blame. I'm seeing that not all assets were depolyed to save these two lives and I want to know why so it doesn't happen again.

natstayl

I have to agree with your last comments. I hope as you do that some lessons were learned that don't have to be repeated. One lesson like this is enough to cause most people to second guess their best efforts... and everyone involved probably is wishing they had done some things differently and that's gotta be a good thing, right? Maybe while the sting is still on everyone's mind, someone ought to start a bond referendum to buy state of the art technology to triangulate cell phone calls. Maybe that person is you? Since you and I feel that those two young people died 60 years too soon, let me know here where to send my contribution.
Nat

Redleg

Regarding the cell phones, someone really needs to lean on the FCC to lean on the cell companies. Some are really dragging hiney. They also need to get these companies streamlined on trying to backtrack calls. It's like pulling teeth with some.

Geico266

Great posts all, we are all on the same page for sure.

I called the local paper and talked to the news editor about soing another article. She agreed that not enough info has been reported and they are going to investigate some more. I'll contiue to update this thread as pertenant info becomes knows.

Redleg

If your interested in the cell aspect and want some more to think about, pm me. A lot of it has been covered locally here, and is old news. Every now and then, the press surprises us and starts inquiring again.

kingofdodge7131

I was at best buy the other day, a mid 30 man came in. Started coughin then couldnt breath. Started weezing turning blue. For no apperant reason. He also worked there so the people that kknew him didnt thinkk he had any problems...... Poor guy froze his lungs and they cramped up i guess, Its what the paramedics had said. Amazing what it can do!




On a bit of a lighter note, I did that once..... Big ole storm so were riding our snowmobiles right down the road, Seemed pretty harmless. Then all the sudden we heard what was glass cracking but Im likek what is that? Found we had drove over a car, shattered the rear window and tore the soft top of the car ( studs) I felt really bad. I guess lucky enough for me,, if the road has 3 inches and hasnt been plowd snowmobiles can run down them legally, So i wasnt " at fault"

Also they thanked me, If i hadnt reported it the plow would have got it, Cops finally came in handy

Geico266

UPDATE:

Police found meth in their truck, and in their toxicology reports. They were stoned. They played the 911 tapes on the radio. These kids were not even trying to help themselves. Really sad to hear someone's last words.

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