The Abbotsford Police Department’s 911 service was temporarily down late Thursday night.
At 11:32 p.m. BC Ambulance Service alerted E-Comm – the agency that provides 911 service to Metro Vancouver – to a problem with 911 service in Abbotsford. E-comm then contacted the APD, which then immediately went to work trying to resolve the issue.
During this time, anyone calling 911 in Abbotsford would have heard a busy signal, Sgt. Judy bird said.
By 12:54 a.m. Friday, the service was back up and running, just over two hours after the last successful Abbotsford 911 call at 10:52 p.m., police say.
During this time, all available police cars were deployed to patrol the streets, providing a visible presence for anyone needing help.
Fire and ambulance services were made aware of the situation in neighbouring communities, in case they were called to assist in Abbotsford.
The APD is working with E-Comm to determine if any 911 calls went unanswered Thursday night.
“It was a very short time frame, so we don’t anticipate that there was missed calls,” Bird said.
She said people were able to call the department’s non-emergency line and get assistance.
APD will be moving its 911 dispatch over to E-Comm on Tuesday but Bird said the service interuption was not related that move. Bird said Telus is working to determine the cause of the interuption.