The primary and secondary submarine cables which carry much of the island's international traffic were completely severed yesterday. The cables are located between Florida and the Cayman Islands, which came under tremendous pressure from the force of the hurricane.

COMPLETELY DISRUPTED

As a result, Internet, international data and international voice services have been completely disrupted. All international calls had to be routed through the company's earth satellite station facility. The company is also working with Intelsat to increase the number of voice channels available through the earth station. Cable and Wireless and AT&T, which jointly own the undersea cables, will be working together to restore them as soon as weather conditions allow.

The local fixed line network is also being affected as the Mandeville exchange and all remote exchanges connected to it, had to be taken out of service because of flooding caused by the hurricane. Additionally, several outside plant modules remain out of service due to the absence of electricity.

Errol Miller, director of corporate communications, announced that bmobile customers will have free text messaging until further notice. He assured that the network was functioning well despite the fact that other cell sites had gone out of service as the back-up generators had run out of fuel and the public power supply had not yet been restored.

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