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1h ago

Optus Confirms Dapto Outage That Blocked Triple Zero Calls

Senior telecom leaders will meet the communications minister this week to address renewed scrutiny of emergency‑call failures.

View of an Optus shop in Sydney, Australia November 8, 2023. REUTERS/Kirsty Needham/File Photo
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Optus -- one of Australia's top telecoms providers -- said the outage on Sunday impacted thousands of people in New South Wales

Overview

  • Optus says a faulty mobile tower in Dapto, NSW, disrupted services between 3:00am and 12:20pm Sunday, affecting about 4,500 people and causing nine failed Triple Zero calls.
  • All affected callers have been accounted for and are OK, with NSW Police conducting welfare checks; one person secured an ambulance using another phone and two calls were accidental.
  • Services have been restored and Optus has apologised while investigating the tower fault that caused the outage.
  • The incident comes 10 days after a separate outage during a firewall upgrade that blocked around 600 Triple Zero calls across multiple jurisdictions and has been linked to four deaths, according to authorities.
  • Singtel Group CEO Yuen Kuan Moon, Optus Chair John Arthur and CEO Stephen Rue are scheduled to meet Communications Minister Anika Wells this week as independent and regulatory inquiries continue.