Mum forced to unlock dying husband's phone with his finger due

A woman has detailed how she was forced to use her unresponsive husband's thumbprint to unlock his phone to call emergency services duri...

A woman has detailed how she was forced to use her unresponsive husband's thumbprint to unlock his phone to call emergency services during an Optus outage.

Adelaide mum Simone Porcaro was among hundreds of Optus customers impacted during a widespread outage across four states last Thursday.

It's understood that a botched firewall update blocked hundreds of calls to triple-0 in South Australia, Western Australia, the Northern Territory and NSW.

The telco giant was unaware of the catastrophic systemic failure until hours later, which wasn't publicly addressed until late the next day.

Ms Porcaro frantically tried to call triple zero six times after her husband Dave collapsed and slipped unconscious due to cellulitis, a serious leg infection.

Unable to get through, her quick-thinking seven-year-old daughter Caitlin suggested trying his phone, which was with another telco provider.

The young girl and her mum managed to manoeuvre his body to get the phone from underneath him and then used his thumb to unlock the phone to raise the alarm.

'It just makes me angry as I should have been able to call triple zero,' Ms Porcaro told Ten News.

'We found the phone tucked underneath him and then we've kind of moved his arm to try and manoeuvre his thumb, so a couple of attempts to get his thumb into the thumbprint so that we can unlock that phone.'

Ms Porcaro eventually received a welfare call from Optus the next day and claimed the operator showed little compassion during the 40-second call.

She has been a loyal Optus customer for 15 years. 

'It was a bit of a scripted call,' Ms Porcaro said.

'They were offering me emergency services over 26 hours later. 

'It was just to tick a box.

'Afterwards I was like, 'are you joking?' You're offering me emergency services over 24 hours later. Where was the phone call, like two hours later or something like that?'

Daily Mail has contacted Optus for further comment.

Mr Porcaro is now recovering in hospital, unlike the 68-year-old Adelaide woman who died from a medical episode during the outage.

It's understood the woman was at home on her own when she began suffering chest pains.

She contacted her husband but his triple-0 call was unable to be connected due to the outage.

It's one of three deaths that have so far linked to the catastrophic telco outage.

'On behalf of our family we mourn the loss of our wife/sister, we hope that the authorities are able to investigate the terrible circumstances so other families don't experience a tragedy like this,' a family statement read.

'We are saddened to hear of the loss of the young child and our hearts go out to the family and others that have been impacted by this event.'

The two other deaths were in Western Australia. 

A fourth fatality, of an eight-week-old baby boy in Adelaide's north, was originally linked to the outage.

But police now believe the outage is unlikely to have contributed to the infant's death.

Optus chief executive Stephen Rue fronted the media for the third time in as many days on Sunday to apologise for the outage, amid growing calls from him to resign.

'We will do an independent review, we will make the facts public, and I can assure you, we will be implementing everything,' he said.

'What I can assure you is that actions are and will be taken to ensure that this does not happen in future.'

Speaking from New York on Monday, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said while there would be an investigation into the incident, he believed Optus' behaviour was 'completely unacceptable'.

'We have made that very clear,’ he told the ABC.

'There will be a proper investigation by the authorities, and the government has action at its disposal, but the immediate concern will be that investigation.

'Find out the facts, exactly how this happened.

'We will await the proper facts and will take what action is necessary.'

When asked if Mr Rue should reconsider his position, Mr Albanese said he'd be surprised if that wasn't already happening.

'But that, of course, is something that, you know, we want to see the investigation take place. What we want is to ensure that something like this shouldn't happen,' he said.

'Optus has obligations as to other communications companies and quite clearly they haven't led up to, they haven't fulfilled the obligations that they have.'

Read more

• Has Optus' astonishing failure left hundreds stranded in dire emergencies, sparking questions about their responsibility in this fatal debacle?
• What devastating consequences arose from Optus' failure to notify about its triple-zero outage in time?
• Outrage as emergency call failure claims innocent lives: How did Optus' network upgrade cause such devastation?
• How did a software upgrade lead to a catastrophic Optus outage leaving 10 million Australians unable to call triple-zero?