System and method for surveying utility outages

摘要

Utility failures are automatically detected and potential causes for these failures are automatically located and identified without having to physically search a utility provider's network. Detection systems capable of monitoring utility status are located at each, or a subset, of the customer premises serviced by a utility provider. A monitoring system, capable of correlating the geographical location of the detection systems with the geographical location of the equipment that comprises the utility provider's network, is located at a utility provider and interconnects with the detection systems through a communications network. The monitoring system queries the detection systems to determine utility status and to subsequently locate an outage and deduce a possible cause for the outage. Detection systems can also be configured to automatically contact the monitoring system to report utility status. The monitoring system is also capable of sending customer based information messages to the detection systems.