At the height of the snowfall on Thursday, Metro's department of emergency communications was taking one or two calls a minute.
Between 8:30 a.m. and 2:00 p.m., call takers answered 575 calls. Calls that were weather-related made up more than half of those calls.
- 178 safety hazards
- 42 injury accidents
- 112 non-injury accidents blocking lanes
With only so many police and fire personnel available, dispatchers had to be quick and discerning, according to the director of the center.
"In this situation, we have to be able to tell is your emergency or what you're explaining an actual life safety emergency or is it an inconvenience," said Stephen Martini.
In addition to staying off wet snow-covered roads, it helps dispatchers if you submit non-emergency reports to the non-emergency line or Hub Nashville.
"It's those calls that folks are saying somebody is stuck at the end of my neighborhood or my car can't get out, things that are inconveniences, they [may be] annoying but they're not emergencies. And they can really ramp up our call volume. Those are the things we really want to encourage folks to use other means to report," Martini said.
