Optus Faces New Emergency Call Outage in Australia

Australian telecommunications provider Optus, the country’s second-largest telco, experienced a fresh outage affecting emergency calls on Sunday, September 28. The disruption impacted approximately 4,500 people in Dapto, south of Sydney.

The incident follows a major emergency call outage on September 18, which was linked to delayed emergency responses and reportedly contributed to four fatalities. The latest disruption was caused by a faulty mobile tower, temporarily affecting emergency services between 3:00 a.m. and 12:20 p.m. Optus has since restored the service and confirmed that all attempted emergency calls were successfully accounted for.

The Australian government has condemned the outage as an “absolutely shocking failure” and is seeking answers from Optus’ parent company, Singapore Telecommunications (Singtel). Singtel Group CEO Yuen Kuan Moon and Optus executives are scheduled to meet with Australia’s Communications Minister Anika Wells to address the ongoing concerns.

This recurring issue has intensified scrutiny over Optus’ infrastructure and its ability to reliably manage emergency services. An independent review of the September 18 outage is underway, with findings expected by the end of 2025.

Reference: Reuters