Power outages hit cellphone giants hard

Load-shedding doesn’t only mean being in the dark. It also results in the loss of cellphone connection‚ telecommunication giants MTN and Vodacom have confirmed.

Both network providers said they had invested in generators and back-up batteries to maintain communication during load-shedding‚ but MTN conceded these were not always sufficient.

“Operational impact was still felt where the frequency of the load-shedding exceeded the capacity of the back-up devices. Our batteries generally have a capacity of six to 12 hours‚ dependent on the site category‚ and require 12 to 18 hours to recharge‚ dependent on the battery technology type. Where consecutive load-shedding took place‚ batteries were unable to fully recharge‚ resulting in reduced back-up times‚” MTN said.

“The uncertainty surrounding the envisaged stages of loadshedding and duration thereof puts additional strain on the network because if the duration and/or frequency of the loadshedding increases‚ the current battery backup autonomy per site is compromised.”

Vodacom expressed similar concerns‚ but stressed that the problem was affecting all network operators.

“We have deployed additional resources‚ batteries and generators at numerous sites. We would like to appeal to customers to take note of Eskom’s load-shedding schedule to try and plan around areas affected by scheduled outages‚” the company said.