Massachusetts State Police Warns Public: DO NOT Call 911 To Test Your Phone Service
As of 11am Thursday morning, there were still over 30,000 customers still without cell phone service. The outage began early Thursday morning and affected mostly customers of AT&T. It also affected select customers of T-Mobile and Verizon.
Downdetector.com is reporting AT&T customers have it the worst right now, with over 60,000 affected. There is still no known cause and no word when it’ll be fixed.
A statement was given from AT&T: “Some of our customers are experiencing wireless service interruptions this morning. We are working urgently to restore service to them. We encourage the use of Wi-Fi calling until service is restored,” an AT&T spokesperson said.
The Massachusetts State Police have also issued a statement. It’s not necessarily a statement, more so a warning.
Apparently, people have been calling 911 to test out their emergency service on their phones. The State Police are asking people NOT to do that as it is disrupting their ability to assist with actual emergencies. You are encouraged to connect to Wi-Fi to make a call or send a text.
Many 911 centers in the state are getting flooded w/ calls from people trying to see if 911 works from their cell phone. Please do not do this. If you can successfully place a non-emergency call to another number via your cell service then your 911 service will also work. #outage
— Mass State Police (@MassStatePolice) February 22, 2024
When cell service is restored, you will know by the SOS symbol being removed from your phone.
You can continue to check the outages nationwide by logging onto www.downdetector.com. They have accurate, up-to-date information as to the number of outages with each cell provider.