FCC to Probe T-Mobile Outage

UPDATE The FCC wants to get to the bottom of Monday night’s T-Mobile network outage. FCC Chairman Ajit Pai called the hours-long outage “unacceptable” and said the agency will investigate.

T-Mobile said it had a “voice and text wireless issue" that began around noon EDT Monday. The company said at 1 a.m. Tuesday that all problems should be resolved. The company blamed an internet-traffic issue that caused problems with its network for the outage, according to the Associated Press. 

AT&T and Verizon both said their networks were operating normally. But there were reports of their customers not being able to call T-Mobile customers, creating the impression of a widespread communications failure.

Public-safety officials were worried about lack of access to 911. For example, the Redmond, Washington, police department tweeted that T-Mobile customers should have “an alternate plan in place in the event you need to call 911.”