Emergency calls to 9-1-1 are again directly reaching the SunComm center that serves several first responder agencies in Yakima County.  On Thursday evening, an outage that originated with CenturyLink resulted in SunComm switching to a backup phone number.  Emergencies could also be reported during the outage by texting 9-1-1.

The outage affected 9-1-1 calling capabilities in multiple western states as well as other internet-based services in several areas of the U.S.  At about 9:45 pm on Thursday, CenturyLink posted on its Twitter feed that, “CenturyLink engineers have identified a network element that was impacting customer services and are addressing the issue in order to fully restore services.”

During the outage, people in Yakima County served by SunComm were directed to report emergencies by calling 509-457-0207.

Additional information will be provided if it becomes available.