FILE - 911 center in Philadelphia Police Headquarters. (Tom MacDonald/WHYY)
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Pennsylvania emergency management officials say an ongoing statewide intermittent outage of the 911 system originated with issues identified in Delaware County.
David Padfield, director of the state Emergency Management Agency, said Next Generation 911, which is an emergency communication system used nationally, detected that emergency calls were “intermittently failing to be delivered” around 2 p.m. Friday.
“This was originally detected with calls going into the Delaware County 911 center,” Padfield said during a Friday night press conference. “The Next Gen 911 service provider immediately notified our 911 team and engaged to start troubleshooting the issue and identifying the root cause of the issue.”
Following operating procedures for situations like this, state agencies coordinated with county 911 systems to assess the impact of the issue across the commonwealth, officials said.
“Other counties began reporting similar issues and without being able to identify a cause, out of an abundance of caution, a statewide wireless emergency alert and emergency alert system message was sent to the public to notify them of the intermittent issues,” Padfield said. “And again, I want to stress, these were intermittent issues.”
Cellphones across the region started beeping at about 3:27 p.m. Friday with an alert from PEMA.
It advised people who are trying to call 911 and not getting through to call their local 911 center on a nonemergency line.
The message did not say the cause of the issue or how long it will take to be resolved.
“We are working with technical experts to resolve the issue and restore service as quickly as possible,” the agency said in an online post earlier Friday afternoon. “Please only call 911 for true emergencies. Do not call just to check whether it is working.”
Padfield said PEMA continues to monitor the situation and work with the Next Generation 911 service provider as well as local counties as the system “continues to have intermittent connectivity issues at this point in time,” but a majority of emergency calls are being delivered.
When asked if this was the result of hacking, Padfield said it is too early to confirm the root cause of the issues. He added that the cause could include software or hardware issues, but that “it does not appear to be the result of a software update that was pushed” based on PEMA’s communications with the Next Generation 911 service provider.
As of 8 p.m. Friday, PEMA said Pennsylvanians should call 911 for emergencies, but if their call fails and is not delivered, they should contact their local 911 center through the nonemergency numbers as the system continues to experience “intermittent and sporadic” issues.
Pennsylvania’s 911 system has withstood heavy demand and call volume through severe weather storms and other emergencies, Padfield said. He called this situation an “anomaly,” but said it was not unheard of.
“We know other states that have had 911 connectivity issues as well,” he said.
Pennsylvania state leaders say they’ve been briefed by the state Emergency Management Agency about the issue.
Gov. Josh Shapiro, in a post on social media, urged people to stay calm and follow directions from PEMA and local authorities regarding emergency calls. He did not provide insight on the cause of the outages, but added that his office would provide updates.
“We are on top of the issue and working to restore full service as quickly as possible,” he said Friday afternoon.
In Philadelphia, city residents are asked to contact their local Philadelphia Police Department district. A list of numbers is available at PhillyPolice.com.
Other nonemergency numbers in the region include the following, 6abc reported:
Bucks County: 215-328-8500
Berks County: 610-655-4911
Chester County: 610-436-4700
Delaware County: 610-565-6575
Lehigh County: 610-437-5252 or 610-437-7751
Montgomery County: 610-635-4300
Montgomery County was quick to share local 911 emergency contacts with the public, posting messages on social media and to its main website.
Todd Stieritz, of the Montgomery County Department of Public Safety, said the county will continue to post updates, but confirmed that residents should call the local 911 center for Montgomery County police, fire and EMS.
A searchable listing of 911 offices and nonemergency numbers is also available at the PA Emergency Agency website.
WHYY News reporter Nicole Leonard contributed to this story.