Fibre box suffers repeat vandalism

An unremarkable grey box at a South Auckland town centre has become somewhat of a magnet for vandalism.

The pulling and cutting of wires is putting vital fibre connections at risk for businesses at Mangere Town Centre.

Nearby Mangere Community Law Centre is even paying extra for a backup connection.

Centre manager David Anstice says the fibre access box has been vandalised four times in under a year.

The box connects the fibre to different customers.

In March, just weeks after fibre was installed the box had already been vandalised heavily, Anstice says.

‘‘Whoever did it sliced through all of the wires, we lost our broadband connection.’’

Then, it was hit again in early April. The cover had been ripped off and wires pulled.

But the box hadn’t been replaced and town centre staff tapped up the box.

It was left alone for months after that. But come November ‘‘somebody else had a go at it’’, Anstice says.

And this month it was ripped open again on January 11.

The centre still pays for a VDSL internet. It’s ready to be connected if the fibre broadband ever goes down.

‘‘We can’t be without the internet for all the services we need. It’s costing us, but we’ll keep it until the box is sorted out.’’

Anstice says Chorus needed to put a protective cage, or something similar, over it to protect the box.

He says he’s frustrated at the toand-fro of getting the box repaired. On numerous occasions he has reported the vandalism to police.

The box has a protective cover and lock, but Chorus says it isn’t able to put a cage over it.

Instead, it will now look to see whether the box can be moved to a more secure location at the town centre.

Spokesman Steve Pettigrew says Chorus is a aware of a number of faults logged for the box in question - especially in April 2016.

‘‘The vandalism caused extensive damage to the feeder fibre which would have resulted in a number of residents losing their fibre broadband service,’’ he says.

It was so bad it took seven days to completely restore the service.

Pettigrew says vandalism of Chorus infrastructure isn’t common, but ‘‘if a vandal is determined, they will find a way to damage the network’’.

He says people should report any broadband issues to their provider.

‘‘We can't be without the internet.’’