Verizon customers across Western Pennsylvania were left without cell service Tuesday, sparking hours of frustration and a flood of complaints online.
Verizon Communications Inc. confirmed the outage was caused by fiber cuts that disrupted wireless service across the region, according to a statement sent to TribLive.
As the outage stretched on, customers reported being stuck in SOS mode and unable to make calls or send texts. Complaints quickly piled up on X, where Verizon’s support account was inundated with replies from users demanding answers, even as the company urged people to send direct messages for help.
Comments and replies began appearing online around midnight and were still being posted as of 2 p.m.
“Our engineers are actively working to solve the issue. Restarting your device will not help, and will in fact complicate the situation. We know how important reliable communication is, apologize for this inconvenience, and thank you for your patience,” said one Verizon comment in response to a Pittsburgh resident.
Katherine Cruz, a spokeswoman for Verizon, said that the cuts had been repaired as of 3:30 p.m.
“The cuts have been repaired and service has been restored for all customers. We appreciate your patience and apologize for the inconvenience,” said Cruz, in a statement.
Comments in Verizon support’s replies also mentioned outages in other states including Illinois, Ohio, New Jersey, North Carolina and more.
Cruz did not respond to a reporter’s request for a timeline of the outages, the number of customers impacted and what areas were without service.