The state of Massachusetts has reportedly announced that residents can now again use 911 services. The cause of the outage, which led to many residents phoning their local emergency services right away before the services were restored, is being looked into.
Around 3:45 p.m., the Massachusetts State Police announced that emergency help requests may be made once the system has been restored. It is unclear how many locations were impacted by the outage.
It further stated that the State 911 Department is investigating what caused the disturbance. The agency reported the first outage at 2:17 p.m.
Residents' phones received a public safety alert message shortly after 2:30 p.m. informing them that there may be delays in public safety response and that all 911 services are unavailable statewide.
Before Tuesday, Boston Police Chief and Police Commissioner Michael Cox announced that citizens wishing to get in touch with law enforcement during the outage of the 911 system might do so by contacting their local police departments or by using the red call box located on street corners to notify emergency medical services.
In an earlier statement, the State 911 Department acknowledged that the 911 system was inoperable and advised citizens to contact their local police directly and restrict their calls to emergencies.
Previous 911 Outages
911 Outages prove to be a recurring instance. Back on April 18, millions of Americans in parts of Nebraska, Texas, Nevada, and all of South Dakota reported losing access to the vital emergency services hotline for approximately two hours.
The outage impacted different areas for different reasons. The City of Del Rio Police Department in Texas blamed the problem on a "major cellular carrier outage," citing T-Mobile.
The department's supervisor of communications, Juan Hernandez, made it clear that T-Mobile's coverage was the issue rather than a malfunction with the internal 911 system.
Similarly, the Chase County Sheriff's Office in Nebraska revealed that landlines continued functioning when 911 services were down for the whole state, except for T-Mobile customers. According to international communications services firm Lumen, a fiber cut caused the outage in Douglas County, Nebraska.
Experts on 911 Outages
Although AT&T confirmed that its network is operating normally, it recognized that a problem with another carrier's network could be disrupting 911 calls.
The Multistate outage prompted experts to call for a revamp in the emergency hotline's systems. The disruption highlights that the nation's 9-1-1 systems are crucial telecommunications services that need immediate improvements, according to Brian Fontes, CEO of NENA, The 9-1-1 Association, a non-profit that concentrates on 911 operations and regulatory issues.
Related Article : AT&T Resolves Issue of Users' Calls Failing to Go Through to Other Carriers Over Network Issues
