Network Outage Intelligence Map Complete
Bringing geographic context to network operations
Gave network operations a shared view that connects outage status to physical geography, so teams understand an outage from one map instead of jumping between monitoring and GIS tools.
Grant County PUD Telecom had the data needed to understand network outages — but it lived in separate systems. Zabbix showed hub health. ArcGIS showed hub locations and service-area boundaries. The problem was the gap between them. During outages, operators still had to manually connect monitoring alerts to geography to understand which areas, customers, and ISPs were affected.
The challenge
A hub alert by itself tells you something is wrong. It does not immediately show where the issue is, what area is affected, or who may be impacted.
That created extra coordination during outages, storms, and planned maintenance. Network admins, field technicians, ISPs, and management all needed the same operational picture, but the context was split across tools.
The idea
Bring monitoring status and GIS data into one view. Instead of asking people to mentally connect a Zabbix alert to a hub location, service area, or customer-impact zone, the map would do that work visually: one map, live hub status, geographic impact.
What I built
I built a network outage map that joins Zabbix hub status with ArcGIS hub locations and service-area polygons. The map gives teams a quick way to see:
- Which hubs are online or offline
- Where affected hubs are located
- Which service areas may be impacted
- How outages relate to geography
- What information may need to be shared with internal teams or ISPs
Why it mattered
The value wasn’t just showing dots on a map — it was reducing the time it took to understand an outage.
Monitoring tools are great at telling you what changed; GIS is great at showing where assets live. Combining them created a shared operational view that was easier to understand during real events.
Outcome
The map turned hub monitoring data into geographic context. Instead of jumping between systems, teams could look at a single view to understand network status, affected areas, and potential customer or ISP impact.
Impact
Before — Hub status and service-area context lived in separate systems.
After — Network operations had a shared map that connected outage status to physical geography.
Read the full technical breakdown
This case study is the short version. The full post covers the data sources, the Zabbix-to-GIS matching logic, the ArcGIS layers, security considerations, and how the map evolved from a prototype into an operational tool.