- Another 911 issue in less than three months in Nemaha County and other southeast Nebraska 911 centers has the Nemaha County Sheriff concerned.
- The Nebraska Public Service commission is already investigating two different 911 issues with different systems providers.
- Windstream confirmed an issue that impacted some 911 centers in the southeast Nebraska 911 region.
Statements:
Windstream: "We take these matters very seriously and conduct detailed reviews. Investigations into events like this one can take anywhere from a day to several weeks to determine the root cause."
Nebraska Public Service Commissioner Eric Kamler: "This is obviously an extremely important issue to all of us at the Commission with the ongoing investigations into both Lumen & Windstream’s 911 outages from August & September. It is too early to tell if this outage yesterday (Tuesdy) is related but obviously many of the same 911 Call Centers that were affected in the Windstream outage from September were the same ones in this outage yesterday. We are working to find out more information from the providers on this outage. Redundancy concerns are the biggest areas of focus in the ongoing investigations and these kinds of outages are simply unacceptable. We expect better and taxpayers demand a more reliable 911 network. Questions about redundancy and network reliability will be asked during two separate public hearings for Lumen & Windstream coming up in the coming weeks. The dates of those hearings will be announced soon."
Nebraska Public Service Commissioner Kevin Stocker: "I was briefed about the outage ... shortly after it happened. These continued failures are not tolerable at any level. It is a high priority of mine to do everything possible to eliminate any further outages and develop an action plan should this happen in the future. The Commissioners have opened two investigations of CenturyLink / Lumen and Windstream on the 2 previous widespread outages. Because this is an open and ongoing investigation I can't comment on the particulars of any findings. I assure you that any corrections that need to be made will be done with the highest priority and in an expedited manner."
Nebraska Public Service Commissioner Tim Schram: "We are currently investigating Windstream and Lumen 911 outages."
Below is a transcript of the on-air broadcast:
In southeast Nebraska, there were issues with 911 systems on Tuesday. The sheriff here in Nemaha County says cell phones could not get through.
I'm Aaron Hegarty with 3 News Now.
It's the second time in under 3 months that the region has been hit with a significant 911 issue, which has the sheriff concerned.
"It's frustrating," said Nemaha County Sheriff Brent Lottman. "Because the purpose of 911 is you can call a number and get help."
With about 7,000 people living in Nemaha County, the 911 lines are not as busy as is larger communities.
Luckily, Sheriff Brent Lottman says he believes no one tried to call on Tuesday in the roughly 20 minutes 911 systems here didn't bring in calls from cell phones.
Other Southeast Nebraska 911 centers saw issues, too, including in Lincoln.
He says there have been plenty of changes to how the system works over the years.
"And it worked fine until two months ago," Lottman said.
"In early September, aftermath from a fire at a Windstream data center in Lincoln resulted in 911 issues in Southeast Nebrask, including in Nemaha county.
911 officials and Nebraska Public Service commissioners tell me 911 systems should have redundancy, meaning there should be backups even if one part fails.
"On our end, it was redundant," Lottman said.
But as for what happened this time the Public Service Commission and Windstream said they're still looking into the cause.
"I would like to see transparency from all sides of this to make sure no one is hiding single points of failure," Lottman said.
The Nebraska Public Service commission is already investigating two 911 issues, including the issues after the Windstream fire and another issue with Lumen days earlier impacting different parts of the state, including Omaha.
"One, having these types of outages are one unacceptable and two, the state and taxpayers have put a lot of money into them, so you want to rely on them," said Christian Mirch, one of five members of the commission board.
Christian Mirch and other commissioners tell me they're not taking the 911 investigations lightly. Mirch expects it'll be a long-term investigation.
Sheriff Lottman said they do have tech that collects a number that can be called back when someone dials 911 from a cell phone. The Public Service Commission says it's likely this latest incident will be included in the already ongoing investigation involving Windstream. The agency says hearing on both ongoing investigations will be held in the near future.
In Auburn, Aaron Hegarty, 3 News Now.
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