In an Emergency: What to Do

Call 911 any time you believe there's a threat to life, property, or safety. You don't need to be certain. If you think something is wrong, call. Dispatchers are trained to help you figure out what's happening.

Common reasons to call 911:

• Fire or smoke, even if you're not sure it's a real fire
• A medical emergency: someone is unconscious, not breathing, having chest pain, having a seizure, or seriously injured
• A car accident with injuries or a blocked roadway
• You smell gas or suspect a gas leak
• Carbon monoxide alarm is sounding
• Someone is in danger or a crime is in progress

When in doubt, call. You'll never get in trouble for calling 911 in good faith. A false alarm is always better than a delayed response to a real emergency. We'd rather show up and find out everything is fine than arrive too late because someone hesitated.

Give the dispatcher as much of the following as you can, in this order:

1. Your location. This is the single most important piece of information. Give the street address, including apartment or unit number. If you're on a road without an address, describe landmarks, cross streets, or mile markers.
2. What's happening. "There's a fire in my kitchen," "Someone fell and isn't responding," "I was in a car accident and someone is trapped."
3. How many people are involved. And whether anyone is injured, trapped, or in immediate danger.
4. Your name and callback number. In case you get disconnected.

Don't worry about saying the "right" thing. The dispatcher will guide you with questions. Stay on the line until they tell you it's okay to hang up. They may give you instructions (like how to perform CPR) while help is on the way.

If you're too panicked to remember all of this, just give your location and say what's wrong. That's enough to get help on the way.

Get out, stay out, and call 911. That's the priority, in that order.

1. Alert everyone in the house. Yell "Fire!" as you move. Don't assume everyone already knows.
2. Get out immediately. Use your planned escape route. If a door feels hot, don't open it. Use your second way out. Crawl low under smoke where the air is cleaner.
3. Close doors behind you as you leave. A closed door holds back fire and smoke, and keeps the air behind it survivable for far longer than an open room. That buys time for anyone still inside and slows the fire's spread.
4. Go to your meeting place outside. This is how you confirm everyone got out. If you don't have a meeting place, pick one now. A mailbox, a neighbor's yard, a tree.
5. Call 911 from outside. Use a cell phone or a neighbor's phone. Don't go back inside to call.
6. Do NOT go back inside for any reason. Not for pets, not for valuables, not for people. Tell firefighters who or what is still inside. We have the gear and training to go in after them.

The U.S. Fire Administration puts it at less than two minutes to get out once the smoke alarm sounds. The most dangerous thing you can do is underestimate how fast fire moves. Get out first. Everything else can wait.

Never throw water on a grease fire. Water causes burning grease to explode outward, spreading the fire instantly and causing severe burns. This is the single most dangerous mistake people make with kitchen fires.

What to do:

1. Turn off the burner if you can reach the knob safely.
2. Cover the pot or pan with a metal lid or a cookie sheet to smother the flames. Slide the lid on from the side. Don't drop it straight down. Leave the lid in place until everything has cooled completely.
3. If you can't safely cover it, get out and call 911. A small grease fire can become an uncontrollable kitchen fire in seconds.

What NOT to do:

• Do NOT use water. Ever.
• Do NOT carry the pan outside. Burning grease splashes easily and causes severe burns.
• Do NOT use flour. Flour is combustible and can cause a fireball. (Baking soda works on very small grease fires, but a lid is safer and more reliable.)

If the fire has spread beyond the pot (to cabinets, the wall, or the range hood), leave immediately and call 911. Close the kitchen door on your way out if you can.

Natural gas is odorless. The rotten egg smell is added intentionally so you can detect leaks. If you smell it, take it seriously every time.

1. Leave the house immediately. Get everyone out. Leave the door open behind you to help the gas vent.
2. Do NOT turn on or off any lights, appliances, or switches on your way out. An electrical spark can ignite gas. That includes light switches, fans, garage door openers, and doorbells.
3. Don't light matches, lighters, or candles.
4. Do NOT stop to phone from inside the house. Make the call once you're outside. You should be leaving, not standing in the building dialing.
5. Once you're outside and at a safe distance, call 911 and then call your gas company's emergency line.

If the smell is faint and comes and goes, it could still be a leak, just a smaller one. Don't ignore it. Ventilate if you can (open windows and doors on your way out), then call for help from outside.

If you hear hissing near a gas line or appliance, that's a significant leak. Get out immediately.

Call 911 immediately. Do not wait, and do not drive them anywhere.

1. Check for responsiveness. Tap their shoulders and shout "Are you okay?" If they don't respond and aren't breathing normally (no breathing, or only gasping), this is cardiac arrest.
2. Call 911, or have someone nearby call while you stay with the person.
3. Put the phone on speaker and follow the dispatcher. They're trained to talk you through chest compressions step by step, in real time, for this exact situation. Do what they tell you.
4. If an AED is nearby, send someone for it. Turn it on and follow its voice prompts. The device tells you what to do and won't deliver a shock unless it detects a rhythm that needs one.

Starting compressions before EMS arrives makes a real difference to survival, and the dispatcher will get you doing it correctly faster than anything you could read here. The technique is best learned through hands-on training rather than from a page during an emergency. See where to get CPR trained.

This information is for general awareness only. It's not medical advice. Call 911 for any medical emergency.

Here's what happens behind the scenes when you dial 911 in Erie County:

1. Your call reaches Erie County 911. A dispatcher answers, confirms your location, and determines what type of emergency you have.
2. Help is dispatched while you're still on the phone. The dispatcher doesn't wait until the call is over. As soon as they have your location and the nature of the emergency, units are alerted.
3. Firefighters are alerted. The call reaches our members wherever they are. They drop what they're doing, whether that means leaving work, getting out of bed, or pulling over on the road, and head for the station or straight to you.
4. The trucks head out. Which ones go depends on the call: an engine for a fire, the rescue for a crash, the brush truck for a field or a treeline, the ambulance for a medical call.
5. We arrive and assess the situation. The first crew to arrive reports back what they find, and more help is called for if it is needed.

For a typical call in the McKean area, you can expect firefighters to begin arriving within minutes of your 911 call. Response time depends on the time of day, weather, and where our volunteers are when the call comes in.

This is why visible house numbers matter. If we can't find your address, every second spent searching is a second we're not helping you.

Treat every alarm as real until you know otherwise.

1. Get everyone out of the house first. Don't investigate first, evacuate first. You can check from outside.
2. Check for smoke, unusual smells, or heat, but only from a safe position. Feel closed doors with the back of your hand before opening them. If a door is hot, don't open it.
3. If you find the source and it's clearly harmless (burnt toast, shower steam, a dusty detector), ventilate the area and reset the alarm.
4. If you can't find the source, or if you're unsure, call 911. Fires can burn inside walls, in attics, or in crawl spaces where you can't see them. Smoldering fires can produce smoke long before flames are visible.

Common non-emergency triggers:

• Cooking smoke or steam
• Dust buildup on the sensor
• High humidity (especially near bathrooms)
• Low battery chirping (a single beep every 30-60 seconds, not the full alarm)

Never disconnect or remove a smoke alarm because it "goes off too much." If an alarm false-triggers frequently, move it farther from the kitchen or bathroom, or add a photoelectric alarm in that spot (better for smoldering fires, less sensitive to cooking smoke). The National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) recommends having both sensor types, or dual-sensor alarms. Ionization responds faster to flaming fires, so swapping one type for the other gives up speed you want. A missing alarm can't save your life.

No, help is already on the way while they're asking.

This is the most common misconception about 911 calls. Dispatchers send help as soon as they have your location and the basic nature of the emergency. The additional questions they ask are happening while responders are already en route.

Those questions serve important purposes:

• They help responders prepare. Knowing whether someone is trapped, whether hazardous materials are involved, or how many people are injured lets us bring the right equipment and request the right resources before we arrive.
• They can save your life while you wait. Dispatchers are trained to talk you through what to do: CPR, how to control bleeding, what to do if you're trapped.
• They help prioritize. If multiple calls are coming in at once, detailed information helps dispatchers allocate resources where they're needed most.

It can feel frustrating when you're scared and just want help to arrive. But the dispatcher isn't slowing anything down. They're making sure the response is as fast and effective as possible. Stay on the line, answer their questions, and follow their instructions.