If you are in New Orleans, Louisiana, and you have an emergency, your operator might be an AI bot.
As reported by the Shreveport Times, the Orleans Parish Communication District (OPCD) has actively deployed the use of AI bots to handle some emergency calls, mostly related to car accidents. The department reportedly has been conspicuously using this method for roughly two years already, with the goal in mind of reducing the load live operators have to handle.
The local paper explains how the process works, according to the OPCD:
After an auto crash has been reported and responders have been notified, the AI call-triage tool kicks in, and only when: 1) All operators are busy, and 2) a 911 call then comes in from within 200 meters of an already-reported accident.
The AI tells the caller they have reached New Orleans 911 and asks if they are calling about the accident at (location). If the caller responds with anything other than “YES” (in any language), they are returned to the 911 call queue to speak with a human.
If the caller responds “Yes,” the AI advises that we are aware of the accident, and tells the caller that if the caller is involved in the crash or has further information to provide, the caller should stay on the line, otherwise they may hang up.
The 911 call is still logged, with all normal metadata and audio recording, and the call remains available should detectives wish to anyone who called about the auto accident.
Its intention is to handle the increase of calls related to one incident, so callers get automatically routed to an AI agent who asks if they are calling regarding the incident. If the answer is yes, then callers can receive information or updates, and if no, then the callers are transferred to a human.
“Every 911 center in the country is dealing with the reality of tighter budgets and inability to reach full staffing even with funding to do so.
“We have found this AI triage tool, used specifically for the scenario outlined above involving motor vehicle accidents, to be an extremely positive use of the technology to make the best use of our staff’s very limited time. Minutes matter when responding to 911 emergencies, and our use of the tool in the very limited way outlined above has been a success.”
Karl Fasold, executive director of the Orleans Parish Communications District, also told Fox 8 Live in July:
“Our accents, inflections in New Orleans are different than a lot of places. Teaching the computer-generated voice to say ‘Tchoupitoulas’ and teaching the AI to understand ‘Tchoupitoulas’ on the other side and get it right has been lots of fun, and that was an easy one for this whole process.
“We listened to 100% of the calls for the first three months. We had no false positives, [and] we had no false negatives, meaning the AI handled the calls it should’ve handled and didn’t try to handle any it shouldn’t have tried to handle.”
What could go wrong?
A lot.
According to Fox 8, there have been no errors, yet. But as the system expands to PDs across the country, call centers themselves will slowly and eventually be phased-out. We know the inevitable “hallucinations” will occur. The AI misheard something, it does not understand idiomatic expressions and coded language, or simply triggers the improper response or none at all.
It’s all fun and games until something very serious happens, and officials say, ‘Don’t blame us, blame the AI.’
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