Vancouver-based national telecom company Telus is facing a lawsuit after a Manitoba man died of a heart attack during a 911 outage. The lawsuit alleges that Telus’ outage contributed to the man’s death.
Dean Switzer suffered a fatal heart attack at his home in Fisher Branch, Man., on March 23, 2025. Switzer’s spouse and the family’s neighbours — all of whom were Telus customers — made roughly 20 calls to 911, but according to a statement of claim filed in Manitoba’s Court of King’s Bench, none of the calls connected.
According to CTV News, every attempted call received an automated message saying the call couldn’t be completed and that the caller should hang up and try again later. Over the next 45 minutes, Switzer’s neighbours performed CPR while trying to contact 911. Eventually, a neighbour was able to contact a friend and RCMP officer, who then dispatched an ambulance. When the ambulance finally arrived, Switzer was pronounced dead.
Telus confirmed it had an outage that lasted 38 hours and 15 minutes between March 22 and 24, and that during the outage some customers couldn’t contact 911. However, the carrier laid the blame on Bell, which operates Manitoba’s 911 network. Telus claims an issue with Bell’s system caused 911 lines to fail, and that a technician sent to investigate the problem didn’t alert higher-ups that it impacted the 911 system.
But Bell claims that Telus was the only service provider unable to place an emergency call on the night Switzer died.
The statement of claim says Switzer would have survived the heart attack if he had received care in a reasonable time. It alleges that Telus failed to provide uninterrupted access to 911, and didn’t report the outage in a timely manner or have a system in place to notify customers of a 911 outage. The claim seeks damages, including the costs for Switzer’s funeral.
“We acknowledge the grief felt by Mr. Switzer’s loved ones. 911 is the most important service we provide as a telecommunications company, and Telus has taken numerous steps to enhance our network resilience and strengthen our processes to mitigate future disruptions,” the carrier told CTV News in a statement.
The allegations have not been proven in court.
Source: CTV News
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