Region hit by phone outage, but 911 service, election continue

Phone service across much of the Big Horn Basin has been disrupted, apparently by the failure of a piece of equipment near Casper, authorities say.  Phone lines in Park County, Big Horn County and Hot Springs County have all been impacted, with a fix not expected until late afternoon.

"This is affecting 911 calls as well as AT&T phones, and local TCT phone lines," the Park County Sheriff's Office said in a Tuesday morning Facebook post, adding, "This is believed to be from a fiber cut and technicians have been dispatched to repair it. It's unknown how long this outage will take to get fixed."

Monte McClain, the communications supervisor for the Park County Sheriff's Office, said the telecommunications provider Lumen alerted him of the outage around 1:30 a.m. Tuesday. Personnel from TCT double-checked the fiber line between Powell and Cody, as the region's last big outage stemmed from a break there, but around 10:30 a.m., McClain said he received word that the issue is believed to have stemmed from a card failure on the toll fiber near Casper.  The hope is that a replacement card can be installed before 4 p.m.

Impacted agencies include the sheriff's office, the Powell Police Department, Big Horn County Sheriff's Office and Hot Springs County. However, help remains available, with emergency calls being handled by Washakie County 911 staff. He said all of the Basin's communications personnel for banding together amid the outage.

To contact the Park County Sheriff's dispatch center for a non-emergent matter, citizens can call 307-254-0226. The Powell Police Department, meanwhile, can be reached at 307-219-1891.

It's also election day. Despite the phone troubles, "everything is going smoothly" with Park County's election, Elections Deputy Katie Johnson reported Tuesday morning.

"All polling locations are up and running and already checking in voters," Johnson said, encouraging residents to go out and vote.

The county's internet connectivity remains intact, she added, so the electronic pollbooks being used at each polling location remain online and operational. Additionally, Johnson said poll workers at each location remain able to call the elections office with routine questions or concerns via landline phones that are on the county's telecommunications network. 

The county has also temporarily set up a cell phone for the elections office. Residents can call the office at 307-272-5669 for assistance, email voterinfo@parkcounty-wy.gov or visit parkcounty-wy.gov/county-elections. 

McClain said that today's outage is a result of "an unfortunate lack of redundancy" within the region's telecommunications infrastructure.

"This is the kind of stuff in public safety that we need to get improved," he said,.

McClain hopes that the state will provide funding to help agencies upgrade to Next Generation 911 service, which is internet-based and can reroute communications in the event of a single break.