Be alert for ‘zero dash zero one seven zero’
Staff writer
A confusing robocall to Marion County residents Sunday is being blamed on a Harvey County dispatcher accidentally pressing a wrong button.
Around 10 a.m. Sunday, several Marion County residences and businesses received recorded telephone messages from Marion County’s Everbridge emergency alert system.
The caller ID said the call was from Harvey instead of Marion County.
Although the message did contain voice-synthesized words announcing a flood warning for both counties, it also repeated a long series of confusing letters, numbers, and punctuation marks.
“This is an emergency message,” the recording began. “Flood warning, National Weather Service, Wichita, KS, nine hundred twenty-four a.m. CDT Sunday, May 25, 2025 [inaudible] save zero dash zero one seven zero seven three zero seven nine one one three one one five two five one eight three zero —”
It continued on, reading nearly 100 additional letters, numbers, and punctuation marks before returning to decipherable language.
It then abruptly ended, saying “some locations that might experience flooding include” without listing any areas.
“We investigated the alert,” Marion County emergency manager Marci Hostetler said in response to a question Monday. “A new dispatcher for Harvey pressed a wrong button on their alert screen.”
Everybridge operates a service, also called Nixle, that Marion County has paid to use since 2013 to send text messages and robocalls about emergency alerts to residents who sign up for them.
Residents may sign up at https://member.everbridge.net/454377475145767/new.
Worldwide, Everbridge claims to send more than 6.9 billion messages annually.