Investigation into 9-1-1, data system outage in Milwaukee County

CREATED Sep. 19, 2012 - UPDATED: Sep. 19, 2012

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MILWAUKEE - Workers in Milwaukee County were trying to figure out what went wrong after a data outage that took out phones, e-mail and the county's 9-1-1 system for hours.

"The Sheriff's office was a victim of it," said Milwaukee County Sheriff's Captain Scott Stiff. 

The system was down for about six and a half hours, from about 7:15 p.m. Tuesday night until about 1:45 a.m. Wednesday.

Spokesman Brendan Conway told Newsradio 620 WTMJ's Jon Byman that a power outage happened at a data center, and the backup system failed to work.

"We did implement an emergency backup plan," explained Stiff.

That plan included crews re-routing 9-1-1 calls to Waukesha's system.  Dispatchers fielded emergency calls and communicated with deputies in Milwaukee.

Stiff told Byman it was not aware of any issues with emergency response in Milwaukee.