[netsharc]

What is "forces it through" in the technical sense? Will the handset boost the sending? Will the base antenna boost its listening capabilities (sensitivity)?

Upthread someone else says the base station will drop other users if it needs capacity for an emergency call. That sounds like an exploit for griefers...

[ssl-3]

Routing an emergency call will use capacity wherever it can, even if it isn't capacity that belongs to your carrier.

Even if it means kicking someone off that is using another carrier.

It cuts through the multi-colored tape and just makes the call happen.

It won't magically produce good service where there is none at all. It doesn't pre-empt physics. It's not even a turbo-boost button.

But by being both largely carrier-agnostic and pre-emptive of other services, emergency calls can use whatever bandwidth might be floating around: Your own service might be such shit in a place that you'll never be able to make a regular call there, while an emergency call may find a better tower and work anyway.

[testing22321]

My understanding is that it also ignores quality of service limits.

So if have have a tiny bit of signal it determines the quality of the call will be too bad and doesn’t connect a regular call. With emergency calls it does.

[ssl-3]

Perhaps so. The trend is definitely for emergency calls to be handled very rudimentarily.

And an unworkable call to 911 that at least connects is better than one that does not.

In the first case, it's possible that a 911 PSAP operator might get a hint that help is needed by someone -- somewhere. It may even be good enough to get a vague idea of where the person is, and which phone it is that is calling.

And that may not sound like much, but it's way, way better than in the latter case, wherein: It is certain that the PSAP will know nothing at all.

(Some data is better than no data.)

[testing22321]

Correct.

I worked at a telco for 4 years. I didn’t work on 911 directly, just some billing/address stuff related to it.

It was VERY important