Verizon outage hampers 911 service across region

SPOKANE — Eastern Washington Verizon cellular customers were left without the possibility of calling 911 on Monday night, Feb. 10, due to a fiber issue that interrupted service.

Service was eventually restored after a couple hours. According to the website Downdetector.com there were more than 2,600 reports of outages, with a map showing Eastern Washington and North Idaho being hit the hardest. Outages were also shown between Wenatchee and Yakima, the Puget Sound area centered on Seattle, north to Everett and south to Tacoma, as well as in the Tri-Cities and Lewiston, Idaho areas. Spokane, Grant, Shoshone and Walla Walla county officials advised Verizon customers through the emergency alert system that 911 access may not be available. Verizon spokeswoman Heidi Plato said the problem stemmed from fiber lines that connect cell sites to Verizon towers. Verizon engineers worked with the fiber provider Zayo to resolve the issue.

Zayo is a communications infrastructure company – including fiber and bandwidth connectivity colocation and cloud infrastructure – headquartered in Boulder, Colo., and London, England.