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N.D. (NewsDakota.com) – Just before noon on Sunday, the shared phone system at Stutsman County Communications lost its Internet Protocol (IP) connections with Richland and Barnes Counties. The lack of IP connection meant that no incoming phone calls of any kind could be answered by the Stutsman County Dispatchers for about 20 minutes. The Barnes County Dispatch Center was also affected.

All Stutsman County 9-1-1 calls were transferred to State Radio in Bismarck where they could be answered. Pertinent information was conveyed by State Radio dispatchers back to Jamestown utilizing a separate phone number not associated with the shared phone system.

The Jamestown Police Department originally called local radio stations to encourage anyone needing assistance to contact them utilizing a police department cell phone number. That action was short lived when a back-up phone system was set up in Dispatch so that Jamestown Police Department and Stutsman County Sheriff telephone numbers could be answered. The 252-1000 non-emergency phone lines could not be reestablished until the IP connection had been restored.

The problem was determined to be a malfunctioning router connection located in Wahpeton. IP connections were restored at about 9:00 p.m. which reestablished the operation of the shared phone system for both Stutsman and Barnes County. 9-1-1 calls originating in Stutsman County were then routed back to Jamestown.

In part, the disruption of IP connections occurred because of the ongoing work that is taking place to integrate Barnes County into the established shared phone system between Richland and Stutsman Counties. At the time of the outage, some of the redundant IP connections between counties had not yet been placed into operation. Work on integrating Barnes County into the Richland/Stutsman County shared system is scheduled to resume on Monday.