When should phone and internet problems be fixed?
Andrew Hirst
Teams working to restore phone and internet services hope to complete the work this weekend.
Work on the damaged Shefa2 cable, between Shetland and Orkney, had begun this week – but had to be paused yesterday (Friday) due to weather.
Faroese Telecom, which manages the cable, said it expected work to resume this morning (Saturday) to be completed by noon tomorrow.
The cable was damaged last Thursday when Shetland suffered a major communications outage.
While a temporary solution was arranged later that day, permanent repairs did not begin until Wednesday.
During the repairs, the temporary solution could not be maintained, leaving some customers without services.
Shetland Islands Council said the connectivity problems had been affecting some telecare and community alarm lines.
Council staff have been contacting clients directly.
However, the SIC has asked families and friends to check in with elderly or vulnerable relatives to ensure that their phone lines are working.
Openreach said yesterday that most traffic, which has “resilient routing”, had been unaffected by the latest outages.
BT said it had a resilient link for its customers via the northern cable.
“BT customers have had working service since we restored the link last Thursday afternoon,” it said.
Anyone with concerns about vulnerable friends or family they should contact the council’s duty social work team on 01595 695611.
