Desperate callers trying to get emergency help may have been left stranded again as embattled telco Optus flags another failing in its network.
The company experienced an outage in the Hunter Valley region of NSW on Wednesday afternoon with mobile data and voice services out of action.
"Optus is responding to a fibre break which is impacting customers in the Port Stephens, Maitland, and surrounding areas," the telco said on its website.
"The ability to connect to triple zero may be impacted for some.
"Optus technicians are onsite working to restore services as quickly as possible."
The latest outage comes days after Optus executives faced a Senate grilling over their failure to act in a September outage linked to the deaths of three people.
Nearly 18 hours passed between learning of the major outage and informing the industry regulator and communications minister of the problem, the inquiry was told.
More than 600 triple-zero calls could not be connected, but the telco initially suggested to authorities the number involved was just a handful.
Optus pledged 300 people would be added to its Australian call centres with a focus on the emergency network, while safeguards surrounding triple-zero calls would be ramped up.
Rules that took effect on Saturday require telcos to report triple-zero outages to the communications watchdog and emergency services in real time.
