Communications system failure - What backups are in place?

[Plectron 1]

As i'm listening to 46.26 tonight i'm hearing allot of agency's have lost their phone lines, it seems to be in diffrent spots across the county, so far ive heard Peekskill, North Salem, Lewisboro, Bedford, and 60 control, were having problems.

So my question is: What backups are in place for phone system failure?

I know some places have cell phone's dedicated for a emergency like this but how long dose it take to forward all the phone lines to cell phones?

[Guest DFFD227]

According to the police hotlines that are out, apparently a subject disabled some very important phone lines in the White Plains area. Police are looking for a 1996 Ford Van - Comes back to an electrical company. So I guess when they said Important phone lines they meant 911 lines? #-o

[roeems87 0]

Yeah, Tuckahoe, Eastchester, and Scarsdale (and possible Bronxville as well) were also down last night. It did have to do with that 1996 Ford Van that they were trying to locate. I am not sure if they ever did.

[Guest DFFD227]

No they never did catch them. In fact they hit Yonkers Sprint store on Central Avenue last night and stole a bunch of cell phones. According to news12 Hastings, Dobbs Ferry, Irvington, Ardsley, Tarrytown, Sleepy Hollow, and Elmsford were all told to call another number in case of an emeregency.

[Guest alsfirefighter]

911 systems were in place in Peekskill. Just not the normal phone lines used for comm between 60 control and PPD. Apparantly it was phone lines for Lightpath system from what I understand.

[DOC22 1]

The following was in todays Journal News (Friday 11-26-04)

Might shed some light on what happened.

These jerks ought to be incarcerated for a LONG LONG time!!!!

911-service disruption leads to 2 arrests in White Plains

Two men yesterday were accused of breaking into a Verizon center in White Plains and stealing equipment, triggering a disruption in 911 service in Greenburgh and other Westchester County communities as far north as Peekskill.

The men had been taken into custody by White Plains police about 10 p.m. Wednesday in the Verizon building, which also serves Lightpath, Cablevision and other electronic-service providers. Early yesterday, work crews from both telephone companies were working to assess the damage and restore full service. No Verizon customers were affected.

The disruption was extensive in Greenburgh, where police put officers at key intersections in town in case of emergencies. Residents were encouraged to use cell phones to call 911 because those calls were being routed through state police.

In Hastings-on-Hudson, police Officer Anthony Gentile said when the service went out, "we kept our fingers crossed. People who needed us got different police departments, and they would get us on the hot line and tell us what the problem was."

Larry Davis, 43, of Brooklyn and Gailican Phillips, 34, of Manhattan, were charged with grand larceny, burglary, computer tampering, criminal mischief, criminal tampering and conspiracy, all felonies, and possession of a forged instrument, a misdemeanor.

The two are scheduled for arraignment today in City Court.

Send e-mail to Roger Witherspoon

[x635 4,066]

So my question is: What backups are in place for phone system failure?

This was an extremly unusual incident, but just goes to show how vunerable our 911 system is in this county. Gosh, if two skells could accomplish what they accomplished.....what else are smarter more "driven" crooks who may be interested in causing trouble capable of? It's very scary!

As far as the backup system goes, this is Westchester County. You expect a backup system?? Not unless there's public outcry for one over a published scandal that equates to bad PR, or somebody steps up to the plate to try and prevent a future reoccurence. But hey, you something frivolous? You got it!!

[RWC130 594]

Back Up? #-o

Thankfully no major incidents happened during the outage.

I believe the back up were Nextel's of DES dispatchers??

I must give kudos, they did an awesome job under the circumstance.

What was that number 490-????

[Pyroinvestigator 0]

I am aware that the white plains and greenburgh area was affected greatly. GPD had no 911 nor Reg. phone or emergency phone lines...so in other words there was no way to call for the police or fire in greenburgh since the lines were down at control also...does this not worry anyone....why was this story so small and lacked to make a point of this....the 911 down in nyc for 4 of the cnty's was huge news....yet why was there never anything put over the news lines..this started prior to 11p and there should have been a scroll on each news telling people a number to call in emergency....next...as stated...what the hell about back up...pull some cards and the whole system is done...what if they didn't catch the guys right away with the cards...how long would it have taken to get new ones....what about security...if this is what can be done...shouldn't this be a guarded area....I believe this story should have been out there about the true scope of this.....

[RWC130 594]

Pyro,

Good points! On 9/11 our world as we knew it was changed forever. If it was that easy to wipe out some major parts of Westchester County 911 system and phone lines I can't help but wonder was this a test?

Is our 911 system an easy target? Obviously...It's scary!

Maybe it was kept "low key" for security reasons? I can't answer that one but it's not the first or last time we have had a cover up

or downplay something such as this.

In Peekskill our 911 worked but the PD could not transfer calls to anyone such as 60-Control for Fire and EMS or to other police agencies. PPD used radios to call 60 for jobs.

I can only hope some good comes out of this. They made arrests...How about better Security? Back Up? All this new technology of phone lines tied into computer systems, well when the system goes down then what?

As I stated before with all the chaos I think DES did a damn good job. Whoops, X635 can I say damn? lol

[Guest alsfirefighter]

Good points, we can start by getting 911 answered at one PSAP. Unfortunately if things go the way they usually do, some politician will want a commission to look into it to make useless recommendations we all know that need to be done anyway.

[Guest WCDES636]

The phones went out!!!!!!!

No wonder it was so quiet at work that night!!!!

[dc2t 80]

So much for security in verizon installations. Verizon should take this as a wake up call. The county should be screaming at there door. [-(

[Guest]

When is everybody going to learn, if the 911 phone system goes out, call your local FD and or PD emergency telephone numbers. Hopefully agency's were smart enough not to discard their old Telephone numbers. Remeber stay calm in an emergency and educate the public. If you panic, everyone will panic. ](*,) ](*,) [-X

[Pyroinvestigator 0]

Ah....that would have been great....but the local PD numbers were out too.....so they had NO telephones!....so now What do ya do!

[WAS967 97]

Light something on fire and pray they see the smoke?

[DOC22 1]

Our old number is call-forwarded to 60 control, so, if 911 goes down people can dial the seven digit humber. If the lines to Control go down we disable the C?F and self dispatch form station 1. Simple, but it works.

[ja3kfd 34]

We in Katonah Have the same set up disable call forward on 7 digit and self dispatch, It has been done before the only lag is the time it takes to be notified there is a problem.

[DOC22 1]

We in Katonah Have the same set up disable call forward on 7 digit and self dispatch, It has been done before the only lag is the time it takes to be notified there is a problem.

My experience has been that 60 control usually picks up on problems pretty quick and gets the ball rollin' pretty fast. But there is a potential for a bit of a lag.