Communications on Hatteras Island restored after fiber cut
Communications to-and-from Hatteras Island, including cell phones and internet, was knocked out Tuesday afternoon due to a damaged fiber optic cable.
Information about the nature and location of Tuesday’s cable cut was not immediately available, and service was restored just before 11 p.m.
Dare County Emergency Management’s “Compact Rapid Deployables” were set up at Hatteras Island fire stations to provide the public access to Dare County’s 911 Communication Center.
They also allow firefighters and emergency responders to connect to Wi-Fi when power is out, and volunteers are also manning stations during the outage.
The CRDs have an operating range of two miles. Two CRDs are in the Tri-Villages, one in Avon, one in Buxton, one in Frisco, and one in Hatteras.
Hatteras Island Community Emergency Response Team mobile emergency communications “hot spots” were deployed at three central locations, which are equipped with Starlink satellite systems.
When needed, the stations are set up with instructions posted on how to connect to the Starlink systems’ phone and internet.
As a result, when communications are down, residents and visitors can drive up to the mobile trailer site, break out their cell phones or laptops, and reach out to the outside world.
Reports are that customers of Brightspeed and all mobile phone providers were affected by the outage that lasted into late Tuesday.
