An extensive cellphone service disruption impacted numerous users across the United States on Thursday morning, leading to significant inconveniences, including the inability of certain police departments to accept 911 emergency calls.
The outage predominantly affected AT&T customers, with reports of disruptions peaking at nearly 32,000 around 4:30 a.m., as per the outage monitoring service DownDetector. This service aggregates real-time outage information from various sources, including direct reports from users.
T-Mobile and Verizon customers also experienced over 800 reported incidents of service interruptions. A Verizon spokesperson attributed these issues to difficulties their customers faced when attempting to connect with individuals on other networks.
The service interruptions were widespread, affecting major cities such as New York, Boston, Atlanta, Houston, Dallas, Los Angeles, and Seattle, and even reaching as far as Montreal, Canada. Users of smaller mobile service providers, including Boost Mobile, Consumer Cellular, and Straight Talk Wireless, also reported connectivity issues.
As a result of the outage, several police departments across the nation issued warnings about potential challenges in reaching emergency services. In addition, many AT&T customers found themselves in “SOS Mode,” limiting their phone use exclusively to emergency calls.
I’m a long term AT&T customer and didn’t experience a service outage here in New Mexico. Typically our infrastructure isn’t as up-to-date as the surrounding states (thanks to socialist, Democrat leadership) so I’m pleased, and surprised, the outage didn’t impact me. It is concerning to hear about something so significant as most folks are heavily dependent on their mobile phones.