A NETIZEN has told of their harrowing experience after their Google phone repeatedly malfunctioned as they tried to call emergency services. In a recent viral post, the Reddit user described how the terrifying ordeal left them unable to call an ambulance for their grandmother, who appeared to be having a stroke at the time. As […]
A NETIZEN has told of their harrowing experience after their Google phone repeatedly malfunctioned as they tried to call emergency services.
In a recent viral post, the Reddit user described how the terrifying ordeal left them unable to call an ambulance for their grandmother, who appeared to be having a stroke at the time.
As they plugged 911 into their Google Pixel 3 device, their phone allegedly froze, preventing them from speaking to an operator.
Fortunately, they were eventually able to get hold of an ambulance service using a landline phone.
“I had to call an ambulance for the grandmother on Friday as she appeared to be having a stroke,” Reddit user KitchenPicture5849 wrote on the popular r/GooglePixel forum last week.
“I got off a phone call with my mom, and proceeded to dial 911 just by typing and calling on my pixel.
“My phone got stuck immediately after one ring and I was unable to do anything other than click through apps with an emergency phone call running in the background.”
They added: “This is all while the phone informed me that it had sent my location to emergency services.
“Sadly I couldn’t tell the person on the other end what apartment I was in, or what the actual emergency was as I was unable to speak to a human.”
The concerned grandchild posited that the phone may have frozen while trying to retrieve their location during the call.
The Pixel 3 features Android’s Emergency Location Service (ELS), which sends location data from handsets to emergency services during emergency calls.
Retrieving that data appears to have caused some issue with the device and prevented the user from hanging up and calling again.
“Luckily my grandmother is of the generation that still has a land line, otherwise I would have had to restart my phone, wait for a reboot, and then attempt to call emergency services so they could get people over asap,” they wrote.
“I’ll let you know from experience that the last thing you want to go wrong during an actual emergency is your phone to mess up.
“Especially when time is of the essence, and the faster you get emergency services to your door, the more likely it is that you will survive.”
The post has racked up nearly 12,000 upvotes on Reddit and messages of sympathy from fellow users.
One commenter replied on the thread: “This is one of the most important posts I have ever seen on this sub.
“Horrifying situation, and I hope everything is okay with you and your family. But thank you so much for sharing. Google needs to address this ASAP.”
Another wrote: “Yeah, this is life-threatening. Google needs to fix it.”
A number of fans claimed to have tried calling emergency services on their Pixel phones and had no issues getting through.
It’s likely that the glitch is a software issue that Google could fix with an update.
A Google spokesperson told The Sun that the company was investigating the incident.
“Our users’ safety is our top priority,” they said. “We take reports of this nature very seriously and are investigating to identify a fix.”
Google launched the Pixel 3 in 2018 with the promise of a gorgeous 6.3in OLED screen and superb camera. It retailed for $799.
It’s not the first time that Pixel smartphones have had issues with calling emergency services.
The Pixel 6, which hit shelves in October, reportedly called contacts and 911 at random without any interaction from the user. Google fixed the bug with an update.
In other news, Apple has announced that it will let customers fix their own iPhones for the first time starting next year.
The UK is fighting an epidemic of hack attacks targeting consumers and businesses, according to officials.
NASA has slammed Russia after a missile it fired into one of its own satellites forced the space station to perform an emergency swerve.
And, a 75-year-old Brit has told of his anger after scammers on WhatsApp fooled him into sending them hundreds of pounds.
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