Overview
- Bell detected a problem with its next‑generation 9‑1‑1 routing at roughly 3:13 a.m. ET and said it had restored service around 4:40 a.m. ET.
- Police and emergency agencies in Ontario, Quebec, Manitoba, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick reported intermittent or lost 911 connectivity in cities including Toronto, Waterloo and Winnipeg.
- Officials urged people to use non‑emergency numbers instead of testing 911 during the outage and said some emergency calls continued to reach dispatchers.
- Bell told authorities it brought backup routing systems online while technicians investigated the carrier‑level fault and agencies say the provincial 911 systems themselves were not the primary cause.
- The incident highlights how next‑generation 9‑1‑1, which lets callers send text, photos and video, depends on carrier call routing and may require new redundancy rules to protect emergency access.