5.30PM UPDATE:
An investigation is underway into the malicious damage of a communications tower in Hexham.
Officers from Newcastle City Police District responded to reports of an incident on Maitland Road about 3.15pm on Wednesday 5 November.
A crime scene has since been established.
Police claim the damage to the tower took place about 9.30am.
As enquiries continue, they are urging anyone with information – or was in the area at the time with any available dashcam/mobile phone footage – to contact Newcastle Police Station or Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.
EARLIER:
Optus’ woes are continuing to worsen with more than 60,000 households affected by a major outage throughout NSW, including the Hunter.
It’s understood the latest issue hit the region, excluding Newcastle, about 10am on Wednesday 5 November, which affected internet, mobile voice and data services.
Other areas impacted by the underground fibre breakage included Grafton, Baulkham Hills and Hawkesbury.
Optus informed its customers in the afternoon to expect difficulties for up to five hours.
“Calls to emergency services are impacted by this outage,” it said in a text message.
“Optus customers will only be able to call them if they are within coverage of another mobile network or are able to call via WiFi.
“Updates are also available on our website https://www.optus.com.au/living-network/service-status”
Amazingly, it’s the second time in less than three months that the same problem has occurred.
In August, another outage left thousands of residents in the dark.
On that occasion, several locales in Sandgate, Branxton, Allandale, Singleton, Sawyers Gully and Aberglasslyn, were “cut off” for a lengthy period.
The embattled telco is front and centre of a parliamentary hearing this week, too.
It follows multiple deaths being linked to a major Triple Zero outage in September.
More than 600 calls could not be connected, but Optus initially suggested to authorities the number involved was just a handful.
Chief executive Stephen Rue said the company wanted to complete welfare checks before presenting authorities accurate data.
“We fulfilled the regulatory requirement, which was to declare that there was a significant network outage,” he told the senate inquiry.
“I was gathering the information to be able to give accurate details, which was outside of the regulatory obligation.”
The behaviour did not make sense, Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young said.
“I’m struggling to understand how alarm bells weren’t rung that the information you had given to the regulator was false,” she stated.
“You didn’t give any further information or update, even when you knew on (18 September) it was worse … if this is how you run your organisation, no wonder it’s in a mess.”
Australian Communications and Media Authority chair Nerida O’Loughlin admitted she was surprised Optus took so long to update the regulator.
“Our expectation would be the telco, in that circumstance, would have kept us up to date on significant changes to the information they have provided… that was not the case,” she said.
Optus announced 300 people would be added to its Australian call centres with a focus on the emergency network, while safeguards surrounding Triple Zero calls would be ramped up.
It’s believed the September outage was caused by human error during a routine firewall upgrade.
That meant Triple Zero calls were not diverted to another network, company officials said.
For more news stories:
- Plans to shore up future of Stockton Beach certified
- Third person charged after alleged armed robbery in Hamilton
- Hunter residents promised three hours of free energy daily
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