ISLAMABAD: Internet services in the country were restored on Friday afternoon, hours after heavy rainfall in upper Sindh caused disruptions in the cable fibre systems of Pakistan Tele­communications Company Ltd (PTCL).

The internet and phone cable systems coming from Karachi have a junction in Sukkur but the equipment was severely damaged after rainwater entered the exchange gateway when downpour battered the region on Thursday night. The outage affected even landline service in all over the central and northern parts of the country.

The problem started to appear in parts of Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa after around 7am, but some wholesale clients of PTCL, including Nayatel, continued its service up to 9:15am through other sources. However, as the day progressed and internet load started to pick up the backup system of other Internet Service Providers also collapsed. Soon, the PTCL telephony too became non-functional. By around 1pm, the internet service started returning to normal in the federal capital followed by other cities and towns. By 2:54pm the PTCL said the technical fault in its optic fiber network had been repaired and the internet services had been restored.

“We regret the inconvenience and thank you for your patience and understanding,” the company said in a statement.

The PTA confirmed that all internet services in the country had been restored. As a large portion of mobile phone companies operate on PTCL’s fibre optic network the problem also caused slowdown and disruptions in the services of Ufone, Telenor and Zong.

Published in Dawn, August 20th, 2022