Verizon faced New Year volume problems

Verizon was expecting a spike in text message volume from midnight through about 4 a.m. on New Year’s eve/day. Since they had seen 284 million messages exchanged at that time last year, the projection for this year was 300 million. We haven’t seen word of whether texters did in fact send that many, but we were forwarded a radio report that claims that Verizon experienced some issues with its voice network during the first hours of the new year. We found confirmation in the Washington Post.

From what we’re reading, the problem was isolated to the D.C. area, and was related to an enormous call volume. We saw this happen earlier this year, though in a more tragic form, when a bridge collapsed in Minnesota. It was recommended that during times of rampant calling — emergencies and yes, New Year’s eve — a text message is the far preferred method of communication, as it uses fewer network resources.

What about you? Any problems making calls during the first few hours of 2008?

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