Several states reportedly lost connection to emergency dispatchers late Wednesday night, inhibiting affected areas from calling 911.
The outages affected parts of Nebraska, Texas, Nevada and all of South Dakota, and the issue was resolved around midnight, CBS News reported.
🚨#BREAKING: There’s a Major 911 outages hitting the entire state of South Dakota and becoming nationwide
Currently, mysterious widespread outages are occurring across the nation, including the whole state of South Dakota and Nebraska, parts of Nevada,… pic.twitter.com/UdDjYDPYAB
— R A W S A L E R T S (@rawsalerts) April 18, 2024
In Texas, the City of Del Rio Police Department posted on Facebook that the issue was caused by a cell carrier, but did not say which carrier was responsible.
“We are aware of an outage with a major cellular carrier affecting the ability to reach 911,” the Facebook post read. “This issue is with the carrier and not the City of Del Rio systems. Our emergency services remain operational.”
Conversely, in Las Vegas and Henderson County, Nevada, officials said they could not see the 911 calls as they were coming in but could see the numbers and were calling them back right away.
URGENT: there is a 911 outage impacting your ability to contact us right now.
Dial 911 on a mobile device, and we will be able to see your number and will call you back right away.
❌911 calls from landlines are NOT working at the moment.
There is no estimate for restoration.
— LVMPD (@LVMPD) April 18, 2024
While the repercussions of this incident remain uncertain, officials told CBS News that all attempted 911 calls were responded to.
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) said on Twitter they are “aware of reports of 911-related outages and we are currently investigating.”