Verizon has fully restored a network disruption that impacted thousands of customers in the United States.
The Federal Communications Commission said earlier on Monday it was investigating the company’s network outage across the United States after thousands of users reported outages. Verizon said in a statement later on Monday that the service has returned to normal levels.
Chicago and Seattle were among the hardest-hit cities and some iPhone users were stuck in “SOS” mode.
The outage began around 9:30 a.m. ET with customers from the Midwest reporting their cell phone service was completely down.
“Well over 100k customers are reporting issues with mobile phones,” Tea Storm Chasers, a nonprofit that tracks storms and police scanner calls, said on X.
A map charting the outages showed that they spread from New York City to as far west as Colorado and as far north as Minnesota but centered mostly in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and parts of Kentucky.
According to DownDetector, a website that monitors internet service disruptions, outage reports came flooding in, with more than 105,000 reported in a single 15-minute time slot around 11 a.m.
Half of those who notified the site cited cell phone internet outages, with 14 percent reporting a total blackout.
Shortly before noon, Verizon released a brief statement on X.
“We are aware of an issue impacting service for some customers,” it said. “Our engineers are engaged and we are working quickly to identify and solve the issue.”
At 7:18 p.m. ET, the company posted an update on X stating that the network disruption had been restored: “Service has returned to normal levels. If you are still having issues, we recommend restarting your device.”
The company did not say what caused the widespread outage, or whether it is related to the damage caused by Hurricane Helene, one of the strongest storms to hit the East Coast in recent history.
In addition to the enormous damage, massive flooding has created dangerous conditions in parts of Georgia, Tennessee, and the Carolinas, impeding Verizon technicians from doing the necessary repairs and setting up generators.
“We continue to experience service impacts in parts of the Southeast due to prolonged power outages, massive flooding, access restrictions, and extensive fiber damage,” the company said in a press release on Sunday evening.
So far, the company has deployed more than 20 mobile satellite assets to provide temporary connections to cellular towers to get them back online while technicians work hard to restore permanent fiber connections. Verizon said 21 more satellite assets are expected to be installed in the following days as it works with local power and telecom providers, first responders, and local and state officials.
The company promised to waive all postpaid domestic calls, texts, and data usage between Sept. 26 and Oct. 5 for all Florida and Georgia customers and its prepaid customers in select counties in Florida, Georgia, and the Carolinas.
“This will bring relief to the thousands of customers who rely on their mobile devices now more than ever, especially during this challenging time,” the company said.
Reuters contributed to this report.