Illustration of a doctor from Samu, here in Rennes. – C. Allain / 20 Minutes
The failure of emergency numbers on Wednesday evening would have had serious consequences. According to the Minister of the Interior, a person with “cardiovascular disease” “would have died” in Morbihan, for lack of “being able to reach the emergency services in time,” said Gerald Darmanin. This tragedy would have occurred while a giant failure occurred at the operator Orange paralyzed the emergency numbers. Contacted this Thursday, the Morbihan prefecture was not reachable.
“Two other cardiovascular accidents” took place in Reunion, added the minister. “But I can’t tell if the time [avant l’arrivée des secours] was particularly long and if it is attributable to this emergency number. What is certain is that the people testified that they tried to call several times and that they did not succeed immediately in obtaining operators, ”he insisted.
No interruption “but a great degradation”
Between 6 p.m. and midnight on Wednesday, a failure of equipment responsible for routing calls massively hampered access to emergency numbers (15/17/18/112) and fixed lines. Many rescue services such as Samu, firefighters or the police were difficult to reach across France. The minister specified that there had been no interruption, but a great degradation.