911 outages still under investigation

PEMA is suggesting residents save their county 911 center’s 10-digit nonemergency number on cellphones.

By BRIAN C. RITTMEYER
TribLive

Pennsylvania’s 911 system is again functioning normally.

Late Friday, 911 calls resumed routing normally across the state, after what were described as “intermittent outages” earlier in the day.

The root cause of the issue is under investigation, and an independent review will be performed to determine what can be done to prevent future outages, according to the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency.

A preliminary investigation found no signs that the outage was cybersecurity-related, said Jeff Robertson, with Comtech Telecommunications, the state’s contract provider.

“Once we isolated the issue, we immediately implemented updates and continued to verify full system functionality,” Robertson said in a statement. “A full root cause analysis is underway and will take several days to complete.”

Allegheny County reported its 911 systems were stable and fully functional as of midnight Friday. There continued to be no issues by 9:30 a.m. Saturday.

“From the moment we were notified of the outage, our staff continuously worked with our vendors and county 911 partners to restore full service to the system,” PEMA Director Randy Padfield said. “The 911 system is the backbone of our emergency response system, and we will continue to ensure it is there when you need it.”

The outages were reported to PEMA about 2 p.m. Friday.

The agency issued a statewide alert about 3:25 p.m. notifying the public about the outage and telling them to contact county 911 centers using nonemergency numbers.

PEMA is suggesting residents save their county 911 center’s 10-digit nonemergency number on cellphones or write them down in an accessible location in case of an emergency and being unable to reach 911.

Nonemergency contact numbers are available online at readypa.info/psaps.