The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is asking Verizon for answers after receiving reports that approximately 10,000 9-1-1 calls were dropped during a Jan. 26 snowstorm. The outage affected trunks that handle wireless 9-1-1 calls in two Maryland counties, Montgomery and Prince George’s. In a letter issued to Verizon on Feb. 17, the FCC outlined its understanding of what happened based on reports and correspondence with affected PSAPs and company representatives.

In the letter, James A. Barnett Jr., chief of the FCC Public Safety & Homeland Security Bureau, said, “The large number of missed 9-1-1 calls on January 26 is truly alarming. I therefore request that Verizon provide an explanation of the causes of this and similar failures, provide Verizon’s assessment of the possibility of occurrence in other locations and describe what actions Verizon is taking to prevent recurrence of these problems.”

In Montgomery County, 14 9-1-1 trunks maintained by Verizon were “automatically” taken out of service by the system over a six-hour period. The first trunk went offline at 5:15 p.m., and the problem cascaded to the other 13 9-1-1 trunks handling wireless calls. All of the trunks handling wireless 9-1-1 traffic in Montgomery County were taken out of service by the system.

Although the trunks have alarms, Verizon did not contact the PSAPs regarding the failure. At 11 p.m., a PSAP identified the problem and contacted Verizon. All 14 trunks were restored to service in 15 minutes. Approximately 8,300 wireless 9-1-1 calls were not delivered.

In Prince George’s County, nine of the county’s 10 9-1-1 trunks were taken out of service beginning at around 8:45 p.m. Service was restored by 11 p.m., but approximately 1,700 wireless 9-1-1 calls were not delivered.

According to the FCC, this outage was not the result of a system overload. Barnett also mentioned two similar incidents experienced by the counties. In both cases, the PSAPs had to notify Verizon. “We are particularly concerned that this problem may be widespread across Verizon’s footprint. We therefore request that Verizon investigate the extent of the problem across its network.”

Barnett has given Verizon until March 10 to investigate the situation and recommend potential remedial actions.

According to a Bloomberg article, Verizon spokesperson Harry Mitchell says, “We have been addressing this issue directly with the counties involved, and will work cooperatively to address the FCC’s questions, as well.”

Related Links

• Click here to read the letter from the FCC.
• “Verizon Asked to Probe ‘Alarming’ Dropped 911 Calls,” by Todd Shields, Bloomberg, Feb. 18, 2011.
• Latest outage affects two counties in Virginia, by Leah Fabel, The Washington Examiner, Feb. 20, 2011.