Statement by Mike Maiorana, Verizon Senior Vice President of Public Sector:

“First responders put themselves on the line each and every day. And every day, we are eternally grateful for their bravery and efforts.

In supporting first responders in the Mendocino fire, we didn’t live up to our own promise of service and performance excellence when our process failed some first responders on the line, battling a massive California wildfire. For that, we are truly sorry. And we’re making every effort to ensure that it never happens again.

As of yesterday, we removed all speed cap restrictions for first responders on the west coast and in Hawaii to support current firefighting and Hurricane Lane efforts. Further, in the event of another disaster, Verizon will lift restrictions on public safety customers, providing full network access.

We’ve been working closely with mission critical first responders to refine our service plan to better meet their unique needs. As a result, we’re introducing a new plan that will feature unlimited data, with no caps on mobile solutions and automatically includes priority access. We’ll provide full details when we introduce the plan next week, and we will make it easy to upgrade service at no additional cost.

Verizon has long been known as the trusted provider of choice for public safety because of our superior network reliability and our partnership with local first responders in times of crisis. Verizon customers have access to our more than 450,000-square mile 4G LTE coverage advantage over competitors. In addition, we consistently show up in times of disaster to extend our network capabilities, provide our customers with loaner devices, and provide customers of any provider with access to free charging stations.

We are proud to support the men and women who serve us all.”