South Australia police have issued a warning after an Optus outage struck the Barossa region on Sunday, affecting mobile voice and data services and potentially impacting calls to emergency services for several hours.
Police say an equipment fault caused the disruption, with Optus technicians resolving the issue by around 12pm. The outage was isolated to the small township of Angaston, about 90km from Adelaide.
In a statement, SAPOL urged residents to seek help in person if they could not reach emergency services. “If you are in an emergency and have no mobile coverage, seek immediate assistance from neighbours, local emergency services, Wi‑Fi calling, or community support networks,” police said.
The fresh disruption comes as Optus remains under scrutiny over the catastrophic September 2025 Triple‑0 outage that left two people dead, including a 68‑year‑old woman in South Australia. Leaked audio revealed confusion inside Optus’ operations centre as emergency calls failed.
SA Police Minister Blair Boyer described the recordings as “alarming”, while a federal parliamentary inquiry is probing the telco’s handling of the disaster. Federal Communications Minister Anika Wells called the failure “completely unacceptable”.
