Should Tanner McCullough leave his house in Bonney Lake, that dose of freedom might well kill him.
Now his family, and those of other autistic children and adults with dementia, have a new tool to find them if they wander.
Pierce County is adopting Project Locate, which uses cell phone technology to track down people who have wandered out of their safety zone.
Tanner, 7, attends Emerald Hills Elementary school. He has an adventurous spirit.
“He loves trains, especially Thomas (the Tank Engine), and he is just learning how to ride a scooter,” said his mother, Paula McCullough. “He is starting to look for freedom and wanting to go outdoors, He is interested in riding a bike.”
The taller he grows, the more locks the family puts on their doors.
“We have latches and stuff to keep him in, but now he’s big, and he’s smart,” McCullough said.
Within minutes, he could be out of sight and in big trouble.
“Before I knew anything about autism, I had a friend with an autistic son,” McCullough said. “I later heard he had wandered. He drowned. He was 6 years old, and went a couple of miles.”
At that time, chance and search parties were the boy’s best hope.
Now those caring for people who, like Tanner, are prone to wander, have a new tool.
Made by Texas-based EmFinders, the EmSeeQ device works on the same technology that can locate a cell phone’s position. The device looks like a bulky old-style digital watch and works on a rechargeable battery.
Tanner wears his on his ankle. People with dementia generally prefer the wrist.
Should Tanner run, his mom would call the company, which would activate the device to ping its location every half hour. Each ping would bounce a signal to the three nearest cell towers, which would triangulate Tanner’s position and send it, with information on the boy, to 911 dispatchers.
Tanner’s mother would already have contacted them, and they would be mobilizing a search team.
“We train and maintain 12 deputies trained and certified in Search and Rescue,” said Pierce County Sheriff Paul Pastor.
Add to that the swift water rescue and dive teams, the volunteer Search and Rescue Explorer Post, Back Country Horsemen, and teams from other cities and agencies.
It all takes under half an hour, and because it sends forces exactly where they need to start, it saves money.
“Last year, I believe that we did about 20 full-fledged searches,” Pastor said. “It is particularly difficult to find a person who cannot speak for themselves or does not understand that they are lost. We are encountering more people with autism, Alzheimer’s and dementia who present such problems.”
Pierce County is adopting the system and calling it Project Locate. Advocacy groups are getting the word, and possible bulk discounts, out to potential users.
In this case, PAVE (Partnerships for Action Voices for Empowerment) and ARC of Washington have been looking into systems that can locate people who, because they are at risk if they wander, wear monitoring devices.
Some use technology that’s too bulky, does not fit smoothly into an emergency dispatch system or gives only a vague starting point. One would have required a system of 45 volunteers to charge users’ batteries.
EmFinders, McCullough and Pastor agree, is the smartest system they’ve seen.
This technology arrives along with new understanding of autism, said Tracy Kahlo, PAVE’s executive director.
When they run, she said, “Kids on the autism spectrum are happy. They want to go someplace, and have a particular place in mind.”
Project Locator, she said, increases the odds that someone will rescue them before they get to that lake, or those woods or rail tracks, or try to cross the traffic between them and the mall, the playground or the fair.
It increases the odds that Tanner can enjoy his adventurous spirit, safe at home or within his mom’s sight.
Kathleen Merryman: 253-597-8677
kathleen.merryman @thenewstribune.com
blog.thenewstribune.com/street
More about Project Locate
Cost: $250 for the device, plus a $35 monthly monitoring fee.
Discounts: When a family sets up the system through PAVE, the monitoring fee drops to $25 a month.
Contact PAVE at 6316 So. 12th St., Tacoma, WA 98465.
Call (253) 565-2266 or 1-800-5-PARENT, and press 3.
Email: E-mail PAVE at pave@wapave.org
More online: Go to www.emfinders.com to learn more about the tracking device.
This story has been edited to correct the price of the Project Locate device. It is $250.
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