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Pennsylvania’s 911 system is back to full strength after it was beset by intermittent outages, including dropped calls, across the commonwealth, officials announced Saturday.
The intermittent outages were first noted about 2 p.m. Friday by Delaware County Emergency Services, the county’s 911 call center, and soon spread to other parts of the state, Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency Director Randy Padfield said at a news conference Friday evening.
Overnight, the agency announced the system was fully operational again after the issue was addressed and county-by-county 911 testing was completed.
“An investigation into what caused intermittent outages will continue, and we will update you on that as soon as we can,” the agency said in a statement.
Chandler, Arizona-based Comtech Telecommunications, operator of the state’s Next Generation 911 system, isolated the problem and brought the system back to full capability with updates, according to a statement from the state’s emergency agency on Saturday.
The “root cause” of the problem remained a mystery and could take several days of analysis to pinpoint, Comtech’s president for telephony, Jeff Robertson, said in the statement.
He said it does not appear the issue was sparked by hackers or any other form of cybercrime. The state emergency agency said its investigation into the cause of the system’s intermittent failures could help it “mitigate future outages.”
The problem for much of the day Friday involved incomplete calls carried by the Next Generation 911 network, officials said.
“From what we’re seeing the calls are going through,” Padfield said Friday night, “with intermittent challenges.”
Those also included dropped calls, calls for which the origin number was unknown, and ones where the location of the caller was not clear, he said.
Those in need of emergency services on Friday were urged to call 911 but to also be prepared to call nonemergency lines in their counties, Padfield said.
Next Generation 911, versions of which are being implemented from coast to coast, is based on the internet and designed to route calls around problems.
The outages came after the push of a software update for the state’s system, Padfield said, but so far, the push did not appear to be the culprit.
“This is an anomaly for us,” he said.
PEMA sent an Emergency Alert System text Friday afternoon to warn cellphone users that 911 was hit-or-miss, he said.
It advised residents to call 911 only for true emergencies and “not call just to check whether it is working.”
Gov. Josh Shapiro said in a statement that his office was on top of the problem.
Multiple regions, including York and Montgomery counties, acknowledged the 911 issue in posts on social media, with York County saying there “may be a delay” in emergency calls being answered.
The Philadelphia Police Department said in a statement on Facebook that the “issue may impact the ability of some residents to reach emergency service.”
“We urge the public to continue attempting to call 911 in the event of an emergency, as some calls are still successfully going through,” the department said.
NBC Philadelphia published a list of nonemergency lines residents can use if they need help urgently and 911 isn’t functioning, including district-by-district Philadelphia police lines and county numbers throughout the region.
Officials urged residents on Friday to have nonemergency numbers ready just in case, and on Saturday they suggested that having a backup number is a wise hedge any time.
“Save your county 911 center ten-digit non-emergency number on your cellphone or write it down,” the state emergency agency said.
Multiple counties in Florida experienced 911 outages on Tuesday after a construction crew in the Groveland area cut a fiber line, NBC affiliate WESH of Daytona Beach and the Orlando area reported.
The National Emergency Number Association (NENA), an organization representing emergency communications professionals, said in June that its 2025 survey of 1,379 public safety professionals found nearly 9 in 10 emergency communications centers across the country experienced a 911 outage in the last year.
Matt Lavietes is a reporter for NBC News.
Dennis Romero is a breaking news reporter for NBC News Digital.
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Pennsylvania 911 system back to normal after dropped calls, trouble geolocating those requesting help – NBC News
