ADAIR — Julie Shilling

Staff Writer



Issues with AT&T wireless service delayed emergency phone calls about a house fire Thursday.

Numerous calls to report the burning home of Jonny Terry, Adair, would not go through. Brandon Hawkins of Mayes County 911 said a neighbor made numerous attempts to call 911 while the house was on fire. Hawkins said he tried to call Mayes County Emergency Director Johnny Janzen, who is an Adair firefighter, and could not get the call to go through to Janzen. Residents in the Adair area have been having trouble with AT&T service, Hawkins said.

Terry said he has been having problems with AT&T since the last part of July. “The biggest part is not being able to call out,” he said.

Terry said a motorist saw smoke from the burning house, but was unable to call 911. The man finally reached a police officer, who also had problems calling out.

Terry experienced a major issue when he tried to return a phone call to firefighter Steve Hall.

“He tried to call me 15 times,” said Hall, who is the mayor of Adair, “to let me know his wife wasn’t in the house.”

Hall called Terry at work to let him know his home was in flames. Terry immediately tried to reach his wife. “I thought my wife was there at home,” he said. After discovering she was at a friend’s home, Terry tried to call Hall back.

The house, which was approximately six years old, caught fire because of a problem with the clothes dryer. Departments responding were Adair, Cabin Creek and Strang. The home was a total loss. Terry said his family was not able to salvage anything. His three children were either at work or school when the fire occurred.

Hawkins called the AT&T compliance center to report the issue with the emergency phone calls. Hawkins said the representative told him the problem would be taken case by case, and each individual who is having issues needed to call AT&T. After further calls, Hawkins said the center called him back and reported that AT&T was working on the problem. Hawkins said he was told AT&T was having internal problems after upgrading the network from 2G to 3G.

In past weeks, Terry said AT&T was blaming the problem on the cell phones and advising customers to buy new SIM cards.

“This has been an ongoing thing,” he said.