The control carried out by ANCOM at the main telephony operators revealed that no interruptions occurred in the functioning of the telephone networks immediately after the earthquake of Saturday, 25 April. However, significant traffic congestions were registered, which led to the rejection of up to 60% of the initiated calls.
The data analysed by the Authority indicate that the first three telephony operators from Romania, respectively Orange, Vodafone and Cosmote, registered a double average number of successful telephone calls made in an one-hour interval from the earthquake compared to the one-hour interval prior to the earthquake and a number of intentions of initiating calls from 3 to 10 times higher in the same interval. As fixed telephone networks are concerned, no traffic congestions were registered, except for Romtelecom’s transit exchanges from Bucharest, Bacau and Galati, where the exchange capacity was exceeded on the average by 10% – 16%. Romtelecom registered a triple number of successful calls in an one-hour interval from the earthquake compared to the one-hour interval prior to the earthquake, whereas UPC and Telemobil registered a double number of successful calls.
After the earthquake, most attempts of call initiation were registered in Bucharest, centre of Muntenia, Dobrogea and Moldova, namely the areas where the seism was the strongest.
The number of calls sent to the operator of the unique emergency call number – 112 – increased by 50% within one hour after the earthquake compared to the one-hour interval prior to the earthquake. The operators have the obligation to complete, with priority, the calls to 112 initiated by their own users and they state to have complied with this obligation, insofar as their technical capacity allowed that. To confirm these statements, a series of tests and additional investigations are required and are to be taken by ANCOM in the following period.
”Some ongoing calls were interrupted at the moment of the earthquake. This was due to the fact that, during the earthquake, certain radio links were disrupted because of the equipment tossing, but they came back to normal after the seism. Most of the hardships encountered by the users who tried to initiate a call occurred during the first hour after the earthquake and were caused by the massive congestion of the mobile telephone networks,” the ANCOM president, Mr. Catalin Marinescu, declared.
”In the event of an actual disaster, communication by means of the commercial mobile telephony networks is jeopardized shortly in the aftermath of the catastrophe. The commercial telephony networks cannot be designed for the maximum number of calls that all the users could make simultaneously, due to the huge costs involved. In extreme situations, such as the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001 from New York, or those from London and Madrid, the telephony networks were overburdened and many users were unable to establish telephone connections. In such cases, the users are recommended to confine themselves to strictly salient and emergency calls,” Mr. Catalin Marinescu pointed out.
ANCOM recommends the establishment of Plans for ensuring the continuity of each operator’s service and their national integration under the supervision of the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, the conducting of regular exercises (once every two years), in order to test the reliability of such plans, as well as the development of programmes for educating the population on emergency behaviour.