Alternative number to calling 000 EMERGENCY in Australia during an outage
In recent times and the past, Australia has had some 000 Emergency call centre failures which may or may not be affecting telecommunications providers NBN, Telstra, Optus, TPG etc (landline and mobile) and all other resellers of their services, from time to time, when trying to make and place a 000 call (News sources quoted below).
When you call 000 in Australia, these calls are routed through to various Telstra call centres who then answer the call and connect you through directly to Police, Fire or Ambulance emergency services.
Recently, the Optus network in Western Australia, Northern Territory and South Australia failed in their ACMA (Australian Communications and Media Authority) obligated requirements to ensure 000 calls are connected, with those calls failing to connect for people needing emergency help or SOS. Sadly three people have died needlessly.
So what do you do in these circumstances?
It's simple, you need to know the alternative number when 000 doesn't work, because it doesn't always work.
In these circumstances, EVERYONE should have some basic survival skills and first aid skills to help when you can not get emergency help. Why? Because YOU are the help until professional emergency services help arrives (unless you're alone).
To mitigate this, you should seriously consider doing our Basic Survival course. This is available for free in our Training Academy and to access the training, you just have to sign up for a no obligation, free trial membership. This gives you plenty of opportunity to undergo the training.
In the Basic Survival course, you will learn the fantastic alternative number to call, should you be in this situation. I can't even say a rare situation, because it's now happened a few times across the providers.
Without any further ado, I implore you to undergo the Basic Survival course. It won't take up too much of your time and it will advise on the alternative number and how to utilise that number in any survival or emergency situation. Remember this one piece of important advice, don't give up trying to get through.
News articles of interest:
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-09-23/timeline-on-optus-triple-0-outage-what-we-know/105805890
At the Australian Peoples Survival League, we care about the safety and survivability of Australians, so we put together plans, processes, training and information to better forge a mutual circle of assistance, so when a crisis emerges, we are better prepared than ordinary persons. Want to be better prepared? Join for free and start your journey of survivability in mutual assistance groups, surviving together.
