Dyer Fire Department launches 'Project Lifesaver' to help locate missing residents

DYER, Ind. - The Dyer, Indiana Fire Department is rolling out life-saving technology for residents who are prone to wandering away from home due to cognitive disabilities and conditions.

The program itself is decades-old, but it's new to Dyer—and has the potential to make a major impact on the community.

What we know:

The program is called "Project Lifesaver" and will provide local families with an added layer of security and comfort. Fire officials in Dyer decided to implement it after several recent cases in which vulnerable residents wandered off and were reported missing.

This program will help bring them back to safety with simple-to-use technology.

"Ultimately at the end of the day, our job isn’t just to respond to calls, it’s also to provide a better quality of life," said Chief Joe Martin of the Dyer Fire Department.

"Project Lifesaver" is designed for individuals of all ages with cognitive conditions or disabilities — like dementia, Alzheimer's, or autism — who are prone to wandering away from home.

"Whether it be a young person with autism, whether it be somebody with Down syndrome, or whether it be grandma or grandpa who unfortunately fall under the dementia umbrella," Martin said.

Founded in Chesapeake, Virginia in 1999, "Project Lifesaver" has since expanded to hundreds of cities, including some in downstate Illinois and Northwest Indiana. According to the nonprofit’s website, Dyer is now the closest town to Chicago to implement the program.

What they're saying:

Individuals who meet the criteria are fitted with a radio transmitter that looks like a bracelet and stays on at all times.

In the event that someone wearing one leaves home and goes missing, firefighters are trained to use a receiver that accurately pinpoints the user’s location through radio frequency signals.

"It looks a little archaic, but it actually works a lot better than Line of Sight GPS. It bounces off these different frequencies and allows us to find a very small DiO that’s inside the transmitter that’s on somebody’s wrist or ankle," Martin said. "We’ll go out with the receiver, and we have an ability on the fire apparatus with a mobile antenna and we’ll start driving around and getting a better idea of a definitive area and location."

Once the team of firefighters locates the general vicinity of the missing individual, they will search the area on foot using the same equipment.  

"Rather than looking visually and finding a needle in a haystack and hoping we are going in the right direction, we know we are going in a general direction and past that, the unit itself will tell us, and it’s all based off chirps and beeps," Martin said.

Due to generous donations, including from the local nonprofit Logan’s Love, the Dyer Fire Department will be providing all bracelets to eligible community members free of charge.

Caregivers will need to check transmitters daily using a tester, which only takes a few seconds. Transmitter batteries will require replacement every 60 days.

"We’re not going to charge anybody who lives in our town a dime," Martin said. "We don’t want to add to their burden, we want to be able to give them the peace of mind knowing that they have a piece of equipment for their loved one, knowing that in the event that they do wander, we’re able to find them and track them a lot quicker."

What's next:

Nationwide, "Project Lifesaver" has helped reunite more than 4,400 loved ones and counting.

The Dyer Fire Department currently has the capacity to fit six people with a bracelet. Each transmitter costs the department $300 to purchase and as donations continue to come in, they’ll increase the number of transmitters available.  

Dyer's very first community member to receive a transmitter is being fitted on Thursday.

To make a donation to the effort or to learn more, contact the Dyer Fire Department at 219-865-4226 or projectlifesaver@townofdyer.com.