Optus initially reported one of the deaths as that of an eight-month-old infant boy in Gawler, north of Adelaide.
The boy’s grandmother had initially told police she had tried to call triple zero on her mobile phone after realising her grandson was not breathing.
Nevertheless, a release from South Australia Police today has provided further clarity on the matter, indicating that the network issue was likely not a contributing factor to the child’s unfortunate death.
“While the family was impacted by the Optus outage, it appears at this stage it is unlikely to have contributed to the death,” the statement said.
“When her call was not connected, she immediately used another mobile telephone in the house and was successfully connected to triple zero.
“The preliminary investigations suggest the child’s death is not attributed to any delay in SAAS [emergency services] reaching the Mulga St residence, despite the first attempt to contact 000 being unsuccessful.”
SA Police said it did not usually make public comments such as this, but believed the public interest in the story meant transparency was required.
They confirmed a full investigation was being provided to the coroner, who will decide whether an inquest will be required.
Police also said the investigation into other death in the state connected to the outage, a 68-year-old woman from Queenstown, was still ongoing.
Optus chief executive Stephen Rue is scheduled to address the media at 3pm AEST today.
