DC911 melts down on confirmed cardiac arrest call
Dispatchers didn't answer radio for four minutes and didn't relay crucial information
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STATter911 has learned that for at least four minutes today (Tuesday), firefighters and medics couldn’t get DC911 dispatchers to answer the radio during a cardiac arrest call. Dispatchers also appeared to delay telling the crew from DC Fire & EMS Engine 11 that the 911 caller with trouble breathing was no longer responding to a call-taker’s questions. At this point, it’s unclear if firefighters and medics were able to revive the person.
Both of these issues are chronic problems at DC911. The 911 center is part of the DC Office of Unified Communication (OUC). STATter911 has shared numerous examples since early 2020 of critical emergency radio channels being abandoned for minutes at a time. This is the eighth such incident that STATter911 has reported in 2025. In addition, there are numerous examples over many years of DC911 workers failing to relay key information to fire, EMS, and police. Often, these occur during calls where seconds and minutes may not be crucial. Today’s incident happened during a call where seconds can be the difference between life and death.
The call
The call was not dispatched as a cardiac arrest. It came in as a trouble-breathing call in an apartment at 3537 11th Street NW. Engine 11 was dispatched at 5:19 a.m (listen at the top of this page). The engine arrived at that apartment but found the door locked. At 5:26, Engine 11 asked a dispatcher to call the person who called 911 to get someone to open the front door. A dispatcher acknowledged that message, but that’s the last thing Engine 11 heard from a dispatcher for eight minutes.
Starting at 5:29, and continuing for four minutes, Engine 11 and Medic 21 made seven calls to OUC. No one answered. There appeared to be no dispatcher working Channel 12. Channel 12 handles EMS calls in Northwest and Southwest Washington. Engine 11 had to switch to the EMS channel that handles the rest of the city to get a response. But even then, Engine 11 didn’t get the information they needed.
Engine 11 needed the information to help decided whether to force entry into the apartment. OUC seemed to be doing everything but answering the questions Engine 11 asked. At one point, a dispatcher decided on their own to send a ladder truck to force the door. The veteran dispatcher somehow didn’t realize that engine companies have equipment to break into an apartment door. Finally, at 5:38, a dispatcher told Engine 11, “The call-taker is still landline with the resident, and the call is off the hook. So, we are unable to confirm what’s going on inside the location.”
This was crucial information. If the dispatcher’s message is accurate, you have to wonder why this information wasn’t relayed to Engine 11 sooner. A person having difficulty breathing who now isn’t responding to the call-taker is information that likely would have prompted Engine 11 to immediately enter the apartment. In fact, that’s exactly what happened once Engine 11 finally heard those words. The question, of course, is how long did OUC hold this information without sharing it with Engine 11?
We are told by sources that the patient was home alone and was the person who called 911. What we don’t know is if the person became unresponsive during the initial 911call just before 5:19 a.m., or during a follow-up call prompted by Engine 11. Either way, it’s information that should have been relayed immediately. It’s also information that likely should have resulted in upgrading the call from trouble breathing to a possible cardiac arrest.
There is one wild card about this incident. At about the same time as the call on 11th Street NW, there was another EMS call on 45th Street in Northeast. When the 45th Street call was dispatched, the dispatcher said that the call was being upgraded to a cardiac arrest. The 45th Street call turned out not to be someone in cardiac arrest. Knowing OUC’s history, it is worth finding out if a dispatcher, supervisor, or call-taker upgraded the wrong call to a cardiac arrest. Upgrading the wrong call is something that has occurred multiple times at DC911. At this point, STATter911 does not have solid information to confirm if that occurred. Either way, based on the information that the caller was no longer responding. it’s baffling that the call on 11th Street NW was not immediately upgraded by OUC,
No answer
In early 2021, after a year of STATter911 reporting on radio channels being ignored, the issue came up before the DC Council. Council member Janeese Lewis George, who just announced she is running to be DC’s next mayor, questioned Cleo Subido, who was OUC’s new acting director. The steps Subido testified that she was taking greatly reduced the number of incidents where radio channels were abandoned. These steps included no longer allowing radio channels to be patched together and not allowing dispatchers to walk around using portable radios. Subido also promised accountability for this issue. Subido was eventually fired by the DC government and currently has a whistleblower lawsuit against the city and Mayor Muriel Bowser.
After Subido’s departure in 2022, the problem with radio channels not being answered resurfaced. Current director Heather McGaffin has testified that she does not require dispatchers to follow the solutions Subido outlined. STATter911 has now documented 33 incidents where radio channels weren’t answered for minutes at a time since McGaffin took over the agency in early 2023.
