Traffic incident causes day-long Internet blackout

A traffic accident in Alfred Station caused intermittent Internet and power outages Nov. 18 throughout Alfred.

The truck involved in the accident pulled out of Tinkertown Hardware and was traveling east on State Route 244 when the incident occurred. The loading boom on the back of the truck, which had not been properly secured, struck electric, phone and TV cables running above the roadway at 10 a.m., according to an Alfred Police Department press release.

According to the press release, two electrical poles were knocked down and a third pole was damaged as a result of the accident. There were no injuries, but the accident forced traffic to be rerouted for approximately 1 hour, 30 minutes.

Time Warner Inc. responded by repairing the fiber optic damaged, according to mass e-mails sent by the Director of Communications Susan C. Goetschius. The e-mail also stated that long-distance phone lines, in addition to the Internet, were likely to experience problems.

Time Warner Inc. informed ITS that the repairs would take a “minimum of 4 hours” before the utility pole could be replaced, according to the e-mail.

Goetschius’s e-mail added that ITS responded to the situation by doing what it could to mitigate the loss of service, although there was little that could be done until the electrical distribution lines and fiber optic network lines were repaired.

The brown out left campus as well as some areas off campus without Internet and cable until later that evening.