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Bt Makes Urgent Repairs After Fault Disrupts Network

From the Press Association Saturday February 26, 2000 2:37 am

Calls to NHS Direct, the AA and the Samaritans have been severely disrupted after British Telecom suffered major problems with part of its network.

Engineers are urgently working to repair the fault which is affecting 0345, 0845 and 0800 numbers.

Calls to banks, British Gas, the RSPCA and National Rail Inquiries have also been disrupted when two main system gateways at BT collapsed, leaving the remaining one swamped with millions of calls.

Internet services where users dial onto the network using 0845 numbers are also affected.

A spokesman for BT said: "Two main gateways to the network at Cambridge and Leeds have been affected by the problems, leaving the remaining one in Croydon swamped with calls.

"Our engineers are doing everything they can to repair the problem and as yet we do not know what has caused the breakdown. It is being treated as a matter of urgency."

A spokeswoman for the Department of Health confirmed that problems with the NHS Direct service were down to BT.

She said: "This is due to a problem with the BT network which they are working urgently to resolve."

People are being advised to use alternative health services instead of calling the nurse-staffed phone line - a 24-hour service which covers 65% of the country and takes around 8,000 calls a day.

The RSPCA says it had also been badly affected by the disruptions. A spokeswoman said: "Due to the problem, contact with the RSPCA regional communications centres is not possible." ==============================

-- Dee (T1Colt556@aol.com), February 25, 2000

Answers

UPDATE LINK

-- Dee (T1Colt556@aol.com), February 25, 2000.

British Telecom Meltdown

Earlier post by spider.

-- Dee (T1Colt556@aol.com), February 25, 2000.