Authorities are investigating vandalism as a potential cause of an Optus outage affecting parts of the Hunter region in New South Wales. The outage, which occurred on Wednesday, disrupted mobile services for residents in areas including Port Stephens and Maitland, and raised concerns about access to emergency services.

NSW Police received a report about the damage to a telecommunications tower located on Maitland Road in Hexham. The incident was reported around 3:15 PM, but the damage is believed to have occurred earlier, around 9:30 AM. Police have declared the site a crime scene and are urging anyone with information or dashcam footage from the area to contact Crime Stoppers.

An Optus spokesperson confirmed that the outage may have affected customers' ability to connect to Triple-0, the emergency services number. They stated that mobile voice and data services were also impacted. As of now, services have been restored to most affected areas, but technicians are still working to complete the restoration process.

Welfare checks were initiated for customers who may have been unable to reach emergency services. Optus indicated that some customers might still be able to contact emergency services via Wi-Fi.

The police investigation is focusing on suspected vandalism and possible copper theft related to the damage at the tower. This incident comes as Optus faces scrutiny following a previous outage on September 18, which resulted in the deaths of three individuals. In response to that incident, Optus has committed to improving its emergency response protocols.

In a recent submission to a parliamentary inquiry, Optus acknowledged that its emergency camp-on system, designed to help mobile devices connect to available networks during emergencies, can take 40 to 60 seconds to activate. The company noted that this delay could lead some customers to end their calls before the system completes the connection.

As part of its response to the September outage, Optus announced that it would notify emergency services of significant outages starting November 1. The company also plans to increase staffing at its Australian call centers, focusing on emergency network support. New regulations require telecommunications companies to report Triple-0 outages to the communications watchdog and emergency services in real time.

The situation remains under investigation, and further updates are expected as authorities continue to gather information.