Operator Error Silences Pagers

Millions of personal pagers across the country were rendered useless Tuesday when a computer operator inadvertently sent out a command that turned off thousands of satellite receivers.

Space Com, a Tulsa-based satellite transmission service, had to manually reprogram the receivers one by one. About 95 percent of service was restored by the end of the workday, and the remainder was expected to be back by this morning.

The biggest concern was in the medical field, where doctors are on 24-hour emergency stand-by. Pagenet and and Seattle-based McCaw Communications said they immediately contacted hospitals, law enforcement agencies and other major customers to tell them their pagers were temporarily out of service.