Rogers, Fido wireless customers affected by countrywide outage

TORONTO — Many Rogers and Fido wireless customers are being impacted by a countrywide cellular service outage and have been left unable to make calls, send text message or use mobile data.

“Some wireless customers are experiencing an intermittent service interruption for wireless voice and data services. Our team is working quickly to restore services as soon as possible,” Rogers said from its @RogersHelps customer care Twitter account. “We apologize for the inconvenience and will continue to provide regular updates.”

DownDetector.ca, a website that tracks network outages, says it started to receive reports of outages just after midnight eastern time on Monday, before peaking at more than 12,000 reports by 8:30 a.m. The website show reports of outages in every province, though most reports have largely clustered around Southern Ontario, the Greater Montreal Area and Calgary.

Rogers and Fido customers impacted by the cell outage can still make 911 calls. However, police departments across Canada, from Winnipeg to Peel Region, Ont., are warning those who need to make an emergency call to stay on the line, as 911 operators will not be able to call back if the call becomes disconnected.

School boards, such as the Durham Catholic District School Board and Dufferin-Peel Catholic District School Board in Ontario, have also said school-issued iPads and hotspot devices will not be able to connect.

The Rogers outage is also impacting fire services. Toronto city councilor Kristyn Wong-Tam tweeted that the remote fire alarm monitoring systems in approximately 850 City of Toronto-owned buildings were down.

CTVNews.ca has reached out to Rogers for comment.