Why didn't the Mccann simply phone the European Emergency No 112

[AnneGuedes]

Old ladies have to know that number, especially when they live alone.

[Mrs. B]

:) In my experience, most of the "old ladies" don't speak the language very well so mainly depend on younger friends & relatives to call emergency services for them.

What part of Gerry McCann thinking that the police had ALREADY been called, & therefore did not need to use Mrs. Fenn's phone, did we not previously discuss?

[Angelo222]

This is a pointless discussion.  We are looking at an event with the benefit of 100% hindsight, and none of us were involved in the panic of six years ago.  They were in a foreign country, in a catastrophic situation, yet at the stage we are discussing, they would still have been hoping for a simple and happy resolution - the child found.  They did the best they knew at the time, and who are any of us to criticise them for possibly not knowing the right emergency number, or for knowing whether to call the PJ or the GNR, for goodness sake!

I don't accept that excuse at all.   A three year old girl had disappeared at 10 o'clock at night in suspicious circumstances and nobody thought to call the police emergency number??  Even after that twit of a receptionist poo poo'd the idea of summoning help Matthew set off on a marathon trawl of possible places she might have gone before returning to the apartment knowing all the time that the police still hadn't been informed. He then blames the receptionist when all he had to do was dial 112.  Did general intelligence and common sense forsake him that night?

[Mrs. B]

112: Commission says EU single emergency number must get multilingual
Since December 2008, EU citizens can contact emergency services from anywhere in the European Union by dialing 112, the EU-wide emergency number, free of charge from both fixed and mobile phones. But, only one in four Europeans knows that this life-saving number exists in other Member States and almost three in ten 112 callers in other countries have encountered language problems.


(...)

Language problems: 28% of callers have language problems when they call 112 while abroad, despite the fact that information provided by 21 Member States indicates that their 112 emergency centres should be able to handle 112 calls in English (12 Member States in German and 11 Member States in French).

http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-09-240_en.htm

Bump

[Chinagirl]

It's not an excuse; it's what actually happened.  As has been pointed out numerous times in this thread, it is highly likely that neither Matthew nor any of the other friends knew of the 112 number.  He acted exactly as was asked of him, and no doubt exactly how most of us would have reacted faced with a similar situation - hope against hope that the child was found and the panic over before ever the police arrived.

[Mrs. B]

It's not an excuse; it's what actually happened.  As has been pointed out numerous times in this thread, it is highly likely that neither Matthew nor any of the other friends knew of the 112 number.  He acted exactly as was asked of him, and no doubt exactly how most of us would have reacted faced with a similar situation - hope against hope that the child was found and the panic over before ever the police arrived.

Yes, & the confirmed phone call from reception, was not to 112 - it was a local number.

[AnneGuedes]

'The police must be called" or "please call the police" or "go to the main reception and ask them to call", or "the police has been called" or "please use my phone to call the police -- no, thank you, it's already done ?" or  "why doesn't this receptionist call the police ?" or "what is the police doing ?" or "why hasn't the police yet arrived ?", etc. etc.
Words, only words for 40 minutes. And a fact, only one : a call to the GNR at 22:41.
Since everyone was equipped with cell phones, since every employee knew enough basic English to understand and translate "little girl missing", it sounds like a story of the other world, as we say in Portuguese.
They have all excuses, but they blamed the police, that's disturbing.
A neutral observer would legitimately ask : was there any interest in delaying the arrival of the police ?

[south of the river]

the other point is that remember this was 2007 - mobile networks have changed a lot in 6 years - They were all on UK networks not local ie they had to make an international call as the call gets routed to the UK by their provider  and then back to Portugal - 

There is always the chance that local no small prefixes do not get recognised -

[Mrs. B]

the other point is that remember this was 2007 - mobile networks have changed a lot in 6 years - They were all on UK networks not local ie they had to make an international call as the call gets routed to the UK by their provider  and then back to Portugal - 

There is always the chance that local no small prefixes do not get recognised -

Yes, & in 2007 the mobile networks in Southern Europe were still appalling IMO - if you lived just a few minutes out of the center of populated areas you had no coverage at ALL (mainly those areas where you WOULD need a mobile phone in an emergency). It has improved a lot of the past years.

[Chinagirl]

A neutral observer would legitimately ask : was there any interest in delaying the arrival of the police ?  (Anne Guedes)

Now we get to the nub of the matter - the reason for the pointless, aimless nit-picking of this thread.  Why don't you spell out why you think the McCann parents and their friends had "an interest in delaying the arrival of the police?"

[AnneGuedes]

A neutral observer would legitimately ask : was there any interest in delaying the arrival of the police ?  (Anne Guedes)

Now we get to the nub of the matter - the reason for the pointless, aimless nit-picking of this thread.  Why don't you spell out why you think the McCann parents and their friends had "an interest in delaying the arrival of the police?"

I don't see any motive to react on a paranoid mode. I don't suspect no one, I'm just wondering, this is how sceptics are.

[Chinagirl]

I don't suspect no one

This is a double negative which equals a positive, meaning you do suspect someone.  Is this what you meant, or did you mean to say "I don't suspect anyone?"

[AnneGuedes]

I don't suspect no one

This is a double negative which equals a positive, meaning you do suspect someone.  Is this what you meant, or did you mean to say "I don't suspect anyone?"

Thank you, Chinagirl, for correcting me : yes I meant "I don't suspect anyone, or I don't suspect someone".
I'm not the suspecting kind, by the way.

[Mrs. B]

A neutral observer would legitimately ask : was there any interest in delaying the arrival of the police ?  (Anne Guedes)

Now we get to the nub of the matter - the reason for the pointless, aimless nit-picking of this thread.  Why don't you spell out why you think the McCann parents and their friends had "an interest in delaying the arrival of the police?"

By WHO? The receptionist who failed to alert authorities immediately? Who else?

Libelous by insinuation btw - "innocent face"

[AnneGuedes]

By WHO? The receptionist who failed to alert authorities immediately? Who else?

Libelous by insinuation btw - "innocent face"

Are you insinuating the receptionist is to be blamed ?
Are you insinuating I made a libellous insinuation against him, Mrs. B ?
What do you mean with "innocent face" ?