By Susan Redden

sredden@joplinglobe.com

The first use of Jasper County’s new reverse 911 system was a learning experience, according to Rich Nordell, executive director of the Jasper County Emergency Services Board.

The system was activated about 2:30 p.m. Tuesday with a message from Webb City police, who were trying to locate a woman who had walked away from her home.

The woman returned home late Tuesday, according to Teague Braker, communications supervisor with the Webb City Police Department.

He said the 46-year-old woman, who suffers from a brain injury, “came back on her own after spending time in the woods.”

Nordell said the reverse 911 system was used to call 925 telephones in the area of northeast Webb City, northwest Carterville and southeast Oronogo, in a three-mile area around the location where woman was last seen.

He said the calls took about 1 1/2 hours to make because the alert went out over the 16 telephone lines available to the county’s 911 emergency communications center. The county had an agreement with the reverse 911 vendor to be able to route calls through the company’s system, where 2,000 telephone lines are available.

“We tried to use their mass lines, but it didn’t work because of a configuration problem,” Nordell said. “They’ve fixed it, and I’m glad we found it before we were trying to use it for a tornado warning or a hazardous-materials spill.”

Had the center been able to use the vendor’s lines, the 53-second message “would have gone out once, over 925 lines,” he said.

Of the 925 calls, 262 were answered by someone who listened to the entire message, 375 went to answering machines and 119 went unanswered, Nordell said. The system recorded a busy signal on 15, tones for a fax machine on 42, and messages for a disconnected or invalid telephone number on 63.

Nordell said he was disappointed by the number of people who hung up, midmessage.

“It may be that people aren’t familiar with the system, but it could involve someone they know,” he said.