FRANKLIN, MASS. (WHDH) - Franklin police are apologizing after a technical issue caused a shelter-in-place alert warning of a person shooting a gun in the open was sent to other communities on Sunday, officials said.
Officers responding to a report of a man shooting a gun on Oct. 11 said they realized when they arrived on scene that “many people had not received the message” to shelter-in-place, and attributed it to the fact that the Franklin 911 system is an “opt-in” system, meaning residents must sign up to get the notifications.
“Given the seriousness of the situation, a man shooting a gun in the open, the risk to innocent people was greatly heightened,” Franklin police wrote in a statement issued Thursday. “Because of this, a second resource from the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency was called up.”
That system, police say, relies on “Geo-Fencing,” which attempts to send wireless messages to mobile devices inside a defined area. But an “unknown technical reason” caused those warnings to be set to residents in communities outside of Franklin.
“This problem is being investigated in the hopes of avoiding problems in the future,” police wrote in the statement. “Safety for the public and officers is at the center of every decision made. As with all incidents lessons are learned. In the future when utilizing resources from outside agencies, such as MEMA, we will be more specific in identifying the Town, and area affected in the message itself. We apologize for any worry that was created, and the disruptions to the Police Departments in those communities.”
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