Disruptions to 911 service are being called rare, despite three outages in the region over the last month.
Service was down Thursday on Pelee Island and again on April 2 because of a weather related issue. There was also county-wide loss in service on March 6 and 7 because of minor equipment failure.
"These types of disruptions, the ones that we've just had, really are the first ones of their kind here, I would say, once out of 15 years," says Phil Berthiaume, the emergency management coordinator for the County of Essex.
Berthiaume adds a new networking format for the Bell phone lines should help deal with future outages.
"It may not completely prevent this from happening in the future, but when it does happen, it will be easier to recognize and immediately deal with the problem," says Berthiaume.
Backup emergency call service was available in both cases, including 911 cellular service. Berthiaume says 911 text service is expected to be rolled out county-wide on April 15.
