By Ammie Ruddle
Some Pendleton County residents experienced cell phone and internet issues beginning May 26 which lasted approximately 24 hours. Rick Gillespie, emergency services coordinator for Pendleton County, said, “an AT&T tower was on backhaul.”
This happens when a cell tower uses a fiber-optic cable to connect cell towers together so they can talk to each other.
According to Gillespie, “the AT&T tower is connected to a Frontier tower” and “one of the fiber optic lines on the Frontier towers was damaged, causing cell phone, landlines, and internet services to be out around the county.”
However, Sunday, May 29, residents experienced another outage that is ongoing.
Gillespie said on Tuesday, May 31, “the reason for this outage is unknown at this time.” He went on to speculate that “the holiday weekend” may have contributed to a “slow response” in diagnosing and addressing the issue.
