Telecommunications Chaos in Sydney CBD

David Heath
Thursday, 17 September 2009 06:43

IT Industry - Market

Tuesday evening's mining expedition by Energy Australia contractors cut multiple fibre optic and copper cables servicing at least 2000 subscribers.  Telstra expects outages to last as long as a week.

The warning lights at Telstra's Global Operations Centre must have lit up like a Christmas tree when Energy Australia contractors cut through the telecommunications services buried under York St in the Sydney CBD.

Telstra has reported that around 2000 phone services were interrupted when the contractors (who apparently have insisted they were using dial-before-you-dig data to ensure they didn't damage anything) cut through the solid concrete that surrounded multiple cable conduits.

Telstra spokeperson Craig Middleton noted, "There was another utility conducting digging works here and it appears they weren't aware that 400mm below the surface in solid concrete we had major copper distribution cables and optical fibre. They've gone through the ducting and through the cables – some have been cut and gotten jackhammer marks all over them."

As well as a large number of fixed services, these cables also appear to service a number of mobile phone towers.

Expected to cost over $1m, the round-the-clock repairs should be completed within a week.  In addition, they have also caused road traffic chaos with two lanes of York St closed for the duration of the repairs – York St is the main traffic access into the north of the city from the harbour bridge.