Fears that calls were not communicated to local garda stations following national computer failure 

Gardaí could not be dispatched to serious incidents - including an armed crime and multiple road traffic collisions - from regional control centres last week due to a national computer system failure.

Gardaí could not be dispatched to serious incidents - including an armed crime and multiple road traffic collisions - from regional control centres last week due to a national computer system failure.

The new GardaSAFE computer aided dispatch (CAD) system crashed for about four hours on August 20 across the four regional control centres which dispatch gardaí to crimes and accidents.

Some gardaí are now concerned that multiple calls may have been missed or were not being communicated to local garda stations quickly enough during the IT crash.

Calls about armed incidents were still being sent to the Critical Firearms Incident Control (CFIC) dispatcher which would send out armed support unit gardaí but they were not going to the local garda division in at least one instance, sources say.

Pen and paper

Gardaí were back to operating “with pen and paper” and some had to resort to handheld radios only to communicate.

The system had problems from about 2pm – 7pm but was down fully for some three to four hours, sources say.

When engineers were called for help, they advised that the system be rebooted – turned off and on again – a few times to see if that would jolt it back into action.

There was “very little follow up” with calls that were not responded to due to the IT failure with some still not followed up on seven days later, sources said.

Although there had been recent issues with the system, with it slowing down or temporarily crashing, they were for brief windows of time – like for approximately 15 minutes some days previously, a source said.

Policies and procedures to follow when the system crashes are not there and a back-up system should be in place, some garda sources said.

"When our A-grade system with all the bells and whistles crashes we need a more basic system for dispatching," one garda source said. 

In Cork, a garda source said that the IT crash created more work for those on duty that day but posed no threat to the public.

Calls could still come into the regional computer-aided dispatch (CAD) control centre through GardaSAFE, located in Angelsea Street garda station.

Those calls were transcribed and could be picked up then by local garda stations across the region, they said.

Although the control rooms were no longer able to dispatch personnel to respond to those calls, the local stations could via radio and did, they said.

“So if there was a call for the Bridewell area, they would dispatch that call from the Bridewell. The notes from the scene were handwritten and updated on the system when it was rebooted.

"Local stations had to take control of local resources and dispatch them according to priority."

A garda statement said that the GardaSAFE system "experienced temporary disruption" on August 20.

No loss of service

"Established protocols were then utilised by the Garda control rooms and there was no loss of service to the public.

"While An Garda Síochána has rigorous safeguards in place, it is important to recognise that any complex IT system may occasionally experience disruptions."

Contingency plans ensured that calls could still be received and managed, the statement said.

And a paper-based backup protocol exists to mitigate any potential system interruptions, AGS said.

The current CAD system called GardaSAFE was introduced last year and operates across four regional control centres – South, North West, East and Dublin Metropolitan Region.

The system, which cost €13.5m to develop, replaced a system in use since 1987.

It’s replacement was first recommended by the Garda Inspectorate in 2009.

The previous CAD system became particularly controversial following the Garda 999 calls scandal, which saw thousands of emergency calls from vulnerable people ‘cancelled’ before an official garda Pulse record was created.

Under the new SAFE system, all calls requiring gardaí to be dispatched to an incident are handled by one of four regional control centres. These control centres are staffed by trained garda call takers and call dispatchers.

So when someone calls their local garda station looking for gardaí to attend an incident, that call is transferred to the regional control centre to arrange gardaí to be dispatched.

999/112 calls are linked directly to the Regional Control Centres for dispatch.