Arabic version: حريق أحراش في كيب يورك يعطل خدمات الاتصالات

According to ABC News, a bushfire near Weipa in Cape York, Far North Queensland, damaged Telstra cabling on Saturday evening and knocked out telecommunications services for thousands of residents in remote parts of the state. Many people have been unable to make calls, including to Triple Zero (000), since Saturday evening.

Telstra said it sent a team of technicians from Cairns to Weipa on Sunday morning to resolve the issue as soon as possible. The company said services were due to be restored on Sunday evening. Fixed-line, ADSL and mobile services were affected, with Telstra’s Mission River, Nanum and Rocky Point sites among those impacted.

Mapoon, Weipa, Napranum and Aurukun were among the affected towns. Optus said it was aware that its customers in the area were also affected, adding: “We understand how important connectivity is to our customers and apologise for the disruption.” A federal government spokesperson said the Triple Zero custodian had been made aware of the outage, while Queensland police had not been made aware of any problems contacting Triple Zero.

Chad King, chief executive of the Mapoon Aboriginal Shire Council, said the outage had affected several towns and left Mapoon particularly vulnerable. The community of about 500 people has no fixed phone system and relies completely on mobile coverage. The council established additional free wi-fi on Sunday to lessen some of the effects.

Mr King said the inability to make emergency calls was a “genuine issue” in a remote area far from police and emergency services. He described one phone tower as a “single point of failure” and called for Telstra and the federal government to improve services in remote and regional areas. The federal government said it was focused on bridging the digital divide and had committed $68 million to initiatives aimed at closing it for First Nations people.