Crime & Safety

911 Restored In Massachusetts After Statewide Outage

Massachusetts residents lost 911 access for about two hours on Tuesday afternoon.

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Neal McNamara, Patch StaffVerified Patch Staff Badge
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A 911 outage hit Massachusetts Tuesday afternoon, leaving residents with only local numbers to call.
A 911 outage hit Massachusetts Tuesday afternoon, leaving residents with only local numbers to call. (Rachel Nunes/Patch)

MASSACHUSETTS — A statewide 911 outage ended just before 4 p.m. Tuesday, local police departments reported.

Departments across the state began reporting the outage just before 2 p.m., and urged residents to call the regular local numbers for police, fire and EMS services. Authorities in Boston urged residents to use fire boxes, if available.

It's still unclear what caused the outage, with state authorities pledging to investigate.

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"The public may now resume calling 911 for emergencies. Thank you for your patience + cooperation. The State 911 Department continues to investigate the cause of the disruption," the state Executive Office of Public Safety and Security said in a tweet just before 4 p.m.

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