Cable theft disrupts service in PB
Vandals or thieves took some 1,500 feet of fiber-optic cable from a broadband facility, knocking out internet and other communication services Wednesday to almost all of Pine Bluff Cable’s customers in the city, according to a company official.
Jeremy Galloway, general manager of Pine Bluff Cable TV, said technicians started getting calls about 1:30 a.m. relating to a system-wide outage. When crews went to the broadband plant on Shannon Road, they found “extensive damage” and immediately called police.
The outage, which was restored by about 5 p.m., affected all parts of the Pine Bluff area, Galloway said, including medical facilities, schools, city and county offices and the Pine Bluff Police Department and other emergency services, he said.
Crews were on the scene Wednesday morning, pulling new fiber-optic cable into the system and splicing and fusing it. Galloway said the repairs would have gone a bit faster had it not been for a storm front that moved through the area around midday causing 40 mph gusts and dropping an inch of rain.
“The storm slowed us down a little but it didn’t stop us,” he said. “We are a provider so we have an obligation to our customers. We work through the wind, rain, sleet, snow and keep working until our last customer is back.”
Galloway said the work of reconnecting customers was aimed first at higher priority users.
“We want to get the police department back up and running,” he said. “Then other key users, such as medical entities, schools and businesses, will be reconnected. After that, we’ll start moving into the residential areas.”
Some 7,000 internet users were affected, he said, but oth
er types of customers were also without service.
“Our telephone service, which is cloud-based, our TV service – all tiers of our products are down right now,” Galloway said early Wednesday.
“The only area that is up and running is a very small area around the Shannon Road station.”
Galloway said the culprits may have thought the cable was made of copper, which could be sold.
“But the material in this cable is mainly just glass fiber,” Galloway said. “It really has no resale value. I’m not sure you could pay a recycler to take it.”
Galloway estimated that the material and labor involved in repairing the system and restoring service to the city will cost $20,000.
A spokesman with the Pine Bluff Police Department said late Wednesday afternoon that the department was investigating the incident but had not made any arrests.