Optus is investigating a fresh triple-zero outage, this time in Illawarra region of New South Wales.
The telco said an issue with a mobile phone tower in Dapto had affected calls made between 3am and 12.20pm on Sunday, including those to the triple-zero network.
Nine triple-zero call failures were identified, including a caller who required an ambulance. That person had used another phone to contact emergency services, Optus said.
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Four of the failed calls were referred to NSW police to undertake welfare checks.
Optus said it had confirmed the welfare of all callers who tried to use the triple-zero network during the outage.
“We sincerely apologise to any customers who were impacted,” the company said in a statement.
NSW police were first informed of the outage when the telco asked police to do a welfare check, a spokesperson for the NSW police confirmed.
“On the morning of Sunday 28 September, NSWPF received a request from Optus to conduct welfare checks on a number of callers in the Dapto area that had attempted to contact Triple Zero and were unable to connect,” the spokesperson said.
“Four welfare checks were referred to police. None required an emergency services response and no further police action was required.”
Optus has had opt-in real-time notifications for outages for emergency services since the end of June, ahead of mandatory notifications coming in November. The company previously argued providing such notifications would be a “huge burden”.
More than 600 households in South Australia, Western Australia and the Northern Territory were impacted by an Optus triple-zero outage two weeks ago.
The company said a routine update to its firewall had caused the problem.
Three people who had called triple zero during the outage had died, including an eight-week-old baby – though police later said the network failure was “unlikely” to be a cause in that case.
Western Australian police later confirmed another death.
The finance minister Katy Gallagher said news of the latest Optus triple-zero outage was “disappointing” but said Australians should still have faith in their ability to call emergency services.
“I understand it is slightly different to the major outage … last week but, yes, it’s still disappointing and, although I understand Optus did make the necessary reports over the weekend, there’s clearly more work to be done,” she told the ABC on Monday.
The minister said government reviews of telcos were meant to ensure the triple-zero system was “in the best shape possible”.
“It’s not satisfactory at all to have people unable to connect in their time of need,” Gallagher said. “We need to make sure that’s as strong and robust as possible. That’s the work that [federal communications minister, Anika] Wells and the regulators are leading.”
Wells is scheduled to meet with Optus executives this week.
The shadow communications minister, Melissa McIntosh, said triple-zero outages are putting lives at risk.
“The government has a responsibility to ensure the triple zero network is always fully operational, and when there is a fault communities must be notified immediately – not after the fact,” she said.
“Exactly how many outages are there each year that we don’t know about?”
McIntosh has called for a full investigation into the triple zero system.
• This story was amended on 29 September 2025. An earlier version included early information that a baby’s death was linked to the outage – police later said the death was likely not related to the incident.
