DC COVID-19 vaccine registration problems continue over weekend

WASHINGTON - People in D.C. hoping to register for a COVID-19 vaccine experienced problems for a third day in a row on the District's vaccination site.

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Many reporting getting error messages or that the site crashing in the middle of use. The phone line set up for making appointments also crashed.

COVID-19 VACCINE FRUSTRATION IN DC AFTER PROBLEMS BOOKING APPOINTMENTS ONLINE THURSDAY

"I went ahead and kept trying," Ana Little-Sana said.

Little-Sana hoped third time would be the charm on Saturday after trying to get an appointment for the COVID vaccine on Thursday and Friday.

"Right as I was about to confirm an appointment the entire site crashed," she said.

Little-Sana wasn't the only one who experienced problems. Hundreds of others took to Twitter expressing their frustration.

@TheTaiganaut tweeted --- "DC's vaccination site continues to be a dumpster fire. Nonfunctional captchas and endless errors even after getting halfway through questionnaire."

At 9:30 A.M., thirty minutes after registration went live, Mayor Muriel Bowser tweeted, "Thank you for your patience. Microsoft had to restart their servers."

"The site was not only not able to handle traffic, it was also very confusing," Little-Sana said.

Little-Sana who has asthma and lived in isolation this past year, ended up getting an appointment after several attempts. She's one of the 3,500 lucky ones who were able to register Saturday.

Those who couldn't get access because of the technical issues will have to wait until next week when more appointments become available.

"In general this process is really confusing and if you don't have access to other people who are going through it, it can kind of feel like you're really alone and just screaming at a computer," Little-Sana said.

Saturday is the third consecutive day users reported problems. On Thursday, thousands of people 65 and older or with qualifying medical conditions never got an appointment because of a "technical review failure that resulted in residents unable to register," according to D.C. Department of Health.

Friday also saw technical errors and frustration.

People waiting to get the vaccine say these issues are unacceptable and the District should have been prepared.

"It really brings about a question of preparedness and what is the roll, especially now, of technology in these city systems. We are our nation's capitol and there needs to be an investment of city services online," Little-Sana said.

The next available appointments won't be posted until Thursday, March 4th.