Jefferson City 911 center responds with backup plan after communication issues

The Jefferson City Police Department said it has a backup plan if its 911 operations center has communication issues again.

ABC 17 News reported Wednesday, the city’s IT department was performing a software upgrade when 911 operators noticed callers could not hear them back around 8:00 p.m.

“They grabbed their cell phones, they grabbed anything they could to make sure nobody was in an emergency situation and we could keep communications going,” Capt. Eric Wilde said.

An operator was also stationed at the Cole County Sheriff’s Office to answer calls.

The 911 center received about 14 calls Wednesday night during the issue, but none were of an emergency nature, according to Wilde.

The issue was solved within about an hour.

ABC 17 News asked JCPD how it can assure citizens the department can keep them safe if they system has similar issues again.

“We’ve got good problem solvers on staff if heaven forbid this main center goes down, we go to the backup center,” Wilde said. “If the backup center goes down we’ve got other plans in place to keep communications flowing.”

The backup center with all the same equipment is located in Fire Station Three.

“We could be there at work out there in 10 minutes if we need to,” Wilde said.

But that would not have worked Wednesday night as the phone glitch affected the backup center too.

Members of the city’s IT department told ABC 17 News they have since rolled back on the update. They assured they would not go back to the updated version until they were positive it would not cause the issue again.

“It’s the first time it’s ever happened and we hope it’ll be the last,” Wilde said.