Sioux Falls, SD – A recent 911 service disruption across several states was attributed to the installation of a light pole.
The incident, which occurred on Wednesday evening, affected emergency communication networks in South Dakota, Nebraska, Nevada, and an unrelated outage in Texas. Lumen, the company providing 911 networking services, identified a third-party company’s installation work as the cause of the interruption.
The outage lasted less than three hours, with services largely restored by Thursday morning. During the disruption, affected areas, including cities like Sioux Falls and Rapid City in South Dakota, and Las Vegas in Nevada, advised residents to use text messaging or landlines for emergency contact.
The Federal Communications Commission has acknowledged awareness of the outages and is conducting an investigation.
This event has raised concerns about the robustness of national 911 infrastructure, following a recent report by the Department of Homeland Security, which pointed out the vulnerability of emergency services to various threats, including cyberattacks.
