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Latest News
Special> Aftermath of the Quake> Latest News
UPDATED: May 13, 2008  
Quake Paralyzes Phone Networks in SW China
In some parts of the province people failed to get on line
 
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 Monday's strong earthquake has cut telephone and Internet links to southwest China, said network operators.

Two trunk transmission networks linking the quake-hit regions in Sichuan Province with the outside were severed, causing the shutdown of three Internet routes, said the China Netcom, a leading broadband and fixed-line operator, in a statement on Monday evening.

In some parts of the province people failed to get on line, the statement said.

The company has assigned technicians to quake-hit regions, equipped with very small aperture terminals (VSAT), maritime satellite phones, ratio stations and power generators while technical teams in other provinces are on standby, it said.

Cell phone services were cut in Wenchuan County of Tibetan-Qiang Autonomous Prefecture of Aba in Sichuan, where the epicenter was located, said a statement from the China Unicom, one of China's largest mobile service providers, on Monday evening.

As the company was unable to reach its local branch in Wenchuan by 7 p.m., technicians and a vehicle equipped with satellite telecommunications facilities had been sent to the county, the statement said.

About 200 China Unicom base stations were out of action in Aba as well as 500 in neighboring Shaanxi Province while a fiber-optic cable between Shaanxi's capital Xi'an and Sichuan capital Chengdu was severed, it said.

Four counties in Gansu, another neighboring province, were also disconnected, it added.

Meanwhile, six counties in Sichuan, including four in Aba, and one in Gansu Province, were unable to be reached through fixed telephone lines because the quake broke fiber-optic cables, according to China Telecom.

The company has sent two contingency vehicles with 15 maritime satellite phones to Wenchuan, the company told CCTV Monday evening.

China Telecom staff were monitoring and controlling the number of phone calls in and out of the quake-hit regions to avoid congestion in the network and ensure telecommunications for disaster relief, it said.

Mobile service operator China Mobile's branch in Sichuan said about 2,300 local base stations stopped operating due to power shutdowns and transmission failures caused by the quake and three switching stations were overloaded.

China Mobile has started repairing affected facilities, the office said.

Besides power disruptions, a surge in call volumes following the quake could have also slowed the cell phone network, they said. Call volumes were 10 times the normal level and the percentage of connections fell by half, China Mobile said.

The ministry of industry and information called on users to talk on phone as shortly as possible to spare room for disaster relief.

The quake measuring 7.8 on the Richter scale jolted Wenchuan County of Sichuan Province at 2:28 p.m. Monday. Tremors were felt in a large part of the country.

(Xinhua News Agency May 12, 2008)



 
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