“I think us as customers and indeed all Victorians expect better and we at least expect to be told exactly what’s going on.
“People need to know that they can access emergency triple zero when they need to.”
Phone lines down at multiple Victorian hospitals
The Royal Melbourne Hospital is one of dozens of hospitals around the country impacted by the Optus outage.
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James Bennie arrived at the hospital’s emergency department on Wednesday morning after falling off his scooter on Tuesday night and cutting his ear.
While getting to the hospital took over an hour due to public transport disruption, the Oak Park resident said things were running smoothly in the emergency department.
He was triaged and told he would be seen in about an hour. But the communications outage meant he was unable to call his family or work to inform them of his injury.
“I can’t tell them what is happening,” he said.
Miriam, who did not want to disclose her surname, spent two hours frantically calling the Royal Women’s Hospital on Wednesday morning after going into labour.
Expectant parents are advised to call midwives at the hospital when they go into labour to receive advice about when it’s best to present at the emergency department.
Lines have formed outside the Optus store in Melbourne’s Bourke Street Mall.Credit: Chris Hopkins
“We couldn’t get through,” Miriam said outside the hospital as she clutched a TENs machine that was attached to her back. “It was very stressful.”
Her husband Dean said they eventually decided to drive to the hospital from their Port Melbourne home to be on the safe side – and many others had done the same.
“Now it’s backed up because that happened to a lot of people,” he said. “It’s crowded but they are doing a good job. We are waiting for a bed.”
The Royal Melbourne Hospital said in a statement that phone lines were down across all services. A code yellow was called at all campuses on Wednesday morning, following the outage, while other services would be provided as normal, the statement said.
The Royal Women’s Hospital said it was unable to take incoming calls due to the national Optus outage.
“We will try to ensure all appointments continue as usual, noting they may be affected by public transport delays,” it said. “Our staff will continue to attend scheduled telehealth appointments. However, we acknowledge some patients may have difficulty connecting to these appointments if they are with the Optus network.”
Epworth, the state’s largest not-for-profit private hospital group, said the Optus outage was affecting inbound and outbound landline calls to the hospital. “For urgent inquiries only, please visit our website,” they said.
Cancer hospital Peter Mac said the nationwide Optus outage was affecting all incoming calls. “We are working to provide contacts for urgent patient calls and appointments,” it said.
All Northern Health campuses are also affected, including the Northern Hospital Epping, Broadmeadows Hospital, Bundoora Centre, Craigieburn Centre, Kilmore District Hospital and Victorian Virtual Emergency Department.
Ramsay Health Care, which operates 73 private hospitals and day surgeries across Australia, said its phone lines were down as a result of the Optus outage.
Optus also released a statement confirming its landlines could not call triple zero.
Severe delays on Melbourne’s train network
Melbourne rail commuters are still experiencing major delays on the entire metropolitan train network after all services were stopped early on Wednesday morning.
Metro Trains said the communications error, which has been linked to a national Optus outage, had prevented trains from running before 5am. Services resumed shortly after 6am.
Commuters have been advised to consider alternative transport during the peak period as normal services resumed. The Department of Transport and Planning said cancellations were likely as trains “get back into position for the normal timetable” and there would be limited impact on V/Line services.
“Passengers using the Gippsland line or the Bendigo, Echuca and Swan Hill lines are encouraged to check the V/Line website for updates, as service changes are likely to continue through the morning,” they said.
The transport disruption occurred as Optus mobile phone services went down across the country, affecting millions of Australian customers.
Metro Trains control centre was unable to communicate with trains on the network for an hour due to the outage.
The company confirmed its backup communication system used the mobile network and was affected by the Optus outage.
Metro Trains chief executive Raymond O’Flaherty apologised to passengers for travel delays and thanked people for their patience while trains returned to the normal timetable.
“Our engineers worked quickly to rectify the issue and we were able to resume trains shortly before 6am,” he said in a statement.
Ridesharing operator Uber experienced a surge in demand on Wednesday morning as a result of the train delays. Some customers were charged double their usual fare.
Metro Trains has advised commuters to listen for announcements at stations regarding cancellations or delays during Wednesday morning travel.
An Optus spokesperson said it was aware of an issue that may be impacting some mobile and internet customers.
“We are currently working to identify the cause and apologise for any inconvenience,” the spokesperson said.
“Train services are now resuming across the Metro network after an earlier communications outage,” Metro Trains said.
“We are expecting major delays to all lines as we restore services. Please listen for announcements and speak to staff for more information.”
VCE chemistry exam to go ahead
The Victorian government has multimillion-dollar contracts with Optus, which includes the Education Department and the Department of Justice and Community Safety, the service responsible for sending emergency alerts.
Hundreds of students have been advised their VCE chemistry exam would go ahead as normal despite disruptions to the communication and transport network.
A spokesperson for the education department said VCE chemistry was the only year 12 exam scheduled to be held on Wednesday.
“The VCAA [Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority] will work with metro schools to support students impacted by travel delays,” they said.
Eftpos payments affected
Business owners reliant on the Optus network have been unable to accept eftpos payments from customers.
The Commonwealth Bank said its terminals, ATMs, branches and apps were still online, but their service centres were unable to receive calls.
What it means for our subscribers
The Optus outage has triggered a service disruption to some subscribers of The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald.
Unfortunately, the outage means our contact centre is currently unable to take any phone calls. If you need contact us, please visit help.theage.com.au, help.smh.com.au, help.watoday.com.au or help.brisbanetimes.com.au and click on the “submit a request” button.
Additionally, the outage has also affected many newspaper deliveries today, resulting in a number of late deliveries. If you haven’t received your newspaper, please send us a request and we’ll credit your account as soon as possible.
You can also keep up to date on the Optus outage via our live blog here.
With Gabrielle Costa and Caroline Schelle
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