atcomsystems.ca/forum Forums General Telecom News 911 problems in Maine

Waiting anything up to an hour to get an answer on 911 -- Not good.

https://www.wcsh6.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=90882&catid=2

Verizon has owned and maintained (patched) that system for many years. Fairpoint has their hands full bring the infrastructure up to date as Verizon hadn't invested in anything in years. It may take a few years but I think we will be better off in the long run.

(Slight detour)

Lately I've had to twist Fairpoint's arm a few times to correct a problem in their Augusta ME DCS that affected a DS3 between Augusta and Portland.

The problem would cause my (3) Augusta FGD carriers and trunks to go out of service. Luckily we have enough spare capacity to the Portland ME tandem to handle this kind of outage.

Verizon is still handling trunking tasks/issues in Maine.

I read the news article. Actually the batteries lasting for 7 hours is pretty good. Sounds like there is no emergency generator at the center. I don’t see how the fiber cables will solve the problem. Whatever type of mux is used will still require power. Once the battery backup is gone, the fiber optics will fail.

Our county just opened a new 911 center. Dual feeds for AC power, central office diversity for the 911 trunking, diverse routing for both the copper and fiber feeds, backup generator with auto-start, UPS for whole building. Verizon owns and maintains the actual 911 equipment. The local Verizon techs did a great job. If all employees were as dedicated and skilled as these 3 techs, Verizon’s customer service problems would go away.