Verizon Wireless’ LTE network may have suffered its second major outage over the weekend, according to customer complaints and reports on multiple tech blogs.
A company spokesman neither confirmed nor denied the reports, but there were a barrage of complaints on Twitter and Verizon’s Facebook page about problems with the LTE service.
The apparent interruption in service did not appear to be as severe as a nationwide crash in April. Verizon never identified the cause of last spring’s outage, which knocked out its LTE network for hours and left affected customers with a slow 1xRTT data connection.
Informa analyst Mike Roberts voiced concerns about the reported problems with Verizon’s LTE network, especially since some indicated the glitch also affected its 3G network, which serves the vast majority of its subscribers.
“Every network outage puts a dent in Verizon’s hard-earned reputation for network quality, which is core to its brand and market success,” Roberts said. “So it is vital for the operator to make sure one to two network outages don’t turn into three, four or more.”
Verizon launched its LTE network last December and has been aggressively expanding into new markets. The service is expected to cover 178 cities by Nov. 17.