Dozens of Manitobans couldn't reach 911 operators during March Telus outage: CRTC report

CBC News

· Posted: Jun 25, 2025 8:10 AM EDT | Last Updated: 4 hours ago

About 5 dozen Manitobans tried to scope exigency services during a Telus outage that stopped 911 calls from reaching a Brandon dispatch centre for a astir 40-hour agelong this spring, the telecommunications institution disclosed successful a study to Canada's telecom regulator.

There were astir 177 calls to 911 made by 59 idiosyncratic callers that went unanswered betwixt astir 10 p.m. CT connected March 22 and conscionable aft 1 p.m. CT on March 24, according to a study Telus sent to the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) connected June 16.

The institution said the outage was caused by instrumentality nonaccomplishment astatine the Bell facility, wherever Telus' 911 strategy connects with Bell's 911 network. 

Telus said it doesn't cognize wherefore the instrumentality failed, but that installation had been experiencing method issues since aboriginal March. 

In its filing to the CRTC, Telus wouldn't disclose the nonstop exertion that failed oregon however its network connects to Bell's, suggesting that accusation could beryllium utilized by 3rd parties to origin outages crossed Canada's 911 telephone system.

The Bell installation nonaccomplishment lone lasted astir 4 minutes, but it had a ripple effect that caused 8 web circuits that delivered 911 postulation to a cardinal exigency dispatch centre successful Brandon. 

There are 2 superior work entree points — oregon exigency dispatch centres — successful Manitoba: 1 successful Brandon and 1 successful Winnipeg.  

The Brandon centre serves 7 constabulary agencies and astir 200 occurrence departments, including Brandon itself and galore agrarian areas crossed Manitoba, according to the City of Brandon. 

Winnipeg's dispatch centre serves the metropolis country and is staffed by municipal constabulary work employees, according to Winnipeg police. 

A Telus technician was paged to respond to the installation wrong minutes of the outage, but did not travel institution protocols to alert Bell and Telus astir the 911 circuit outage. The technician besides failed to escalate the contented wrong the company, Telus said. 

Telus said it has disciplined the employee, whose actions prolonged the outage. 

During the astir 40 hours that Telus users were incapable to scope the dispatch centre, 55-year-old Dean Switzer died of a bosom onslaught successful Fisher Branch, a agrarian assemblage successful Manitoba's Interlake region.

On March 23, his household tried to telephone 911 much than 20 times.

The work was reconnected conscionable hours later. Staff from the Brandon dispatch centre notified Telus' 911 squad astir 10 a.m. CT connected March 24, according to the company. 

Telus said it instantly worked with Bell to resoluteness the contented and dispatch started receiving calls again conscionable implicit an hr later. 

Outage prompts changes to network: Telus

Telus said it reviewed however its 911 calls are delivered crossed its networks, adding an alternate way to nonstop exigency calls straight from Telus to Bell's web successful lawsuit a akin nonaccomplishment happens again. 

If that way fails, Telus said it volition nonstop calls to its relation services team, and a unit subordinate volition manually link the telephone to the close dispatch centre.

"TELUS confirms that with these backup processes successful place, 9-1-1 calls volition proceed to implicit adjacent with an instrumentality outage of this kind," the institution said successful its report.